


The Ambitious Crossover Nobody Asked For

by Philiah



Category: Death Note (Anime & Manga), モブサイコ100 | Mob Psycho 100, ワンパンマン | One-Punch Man, 文豪ストレイドッグス | Bungou Stray Dogs
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Crack Crossover, Crossover, Escape Rooms, Established Relationship, F/M, Flirting, Fluff, Gen, Hanging Out, It's just a, M/M, Multi, Multiple Crossovers, Not Canon Compliant, Out of Character, Polyamory, Puppy Love, a very big, for death note characters at least, hopefully not though, i think, what do I even tag this
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-11
Updated: 2020-07-11
Packaged: 2021-03-03 19:35:06
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 34,289
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24820927
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Philiah/pseuds/Philiah
Summary: To commemorate Kira's defeat, Tokyo holds an event to celebrate. Featuring an escape room for kids below seventeen and a challenge presented by L himself!Ranpo attends, thinking he's better than L.Reigen attends, because he hears there's prize money involved in the escape room challenge.Saitama attends, because he has to babysit Child Emperor.ORA crossover I wrote as a challenge to myself, and also because I love writing children hanging out.
Relationships: Edogawa Ranpo/Edgar Allan Poe (Bungou Stray Dogs), Genos/Saitama (One-Punch Man), Hanazawa Teruki/Kageyama "Mob" Shigeo, Izumi Kyouka/Miyazawa Kenji (Bungou Stray Dogs), Kageyama Ritsu/Suzuki Shou, Matt | Mail Jeevas/Mello | Mihael Keehl/Near | Nate River
Comments: 11
Kudos: 44





	The Ambitious Crossover Nobody Asked For

**Author's Note:**

> [Big thanks to my friend for beta reading this ENTIRE fic, you are very cool Shara.]
> 
> The timeline of things:  
> Post season 3 BSD (I haven’t read manga yet)  
> Death Note if Yagami Light decided to not continue his antics after getting back the death note from the Yotsuba  
> Post ending of Mob Psycho  
> Pre Monster Association attacks of One Punch Man
> 
> Escape room inspired by literally the film; Escape Room (2019)
> 
> [Or: Me screaming that I miss L so much: The fanfic]
> 
> Other things to note:  
> Saitama and the Kageyama's are related in this.  
> Near, Mello and Matt are all around 13-14 in this.  
> I've renamed Child Emperor as Doutei to save myself some time.  
> Background Dimple/Reigen/Serizawa (Dimple&Serizawa don't turn up physically so I didn't tag em)

The office was silent except for the sound of Kunikida typing away on his keyboard and papers being flipped back on forth. Then there was the sound of a chip bag being torn open and a newspaper being unfolded before;

“What? What do you _mean_ I’m not the greatest detective?” Ranpo, in short, was more than just offended. He was insulted to the core, not because he was jealous about him not being number one, but because his work wasn’t as recognized as this so-called “greatest” detective. Ranpo never knew about this guy until today, but after more digging, apparently L wasn’t just well recognized, he was _famous internationally._

So famous, he has a whole orphanage aimed to train children to become his successor. How cool yet unfair was that? L took, what, months to solve this one case? Ranpo would’ve taken at best a day, or even less.

“Don’t be so upset. You know what they say, there’s always a bigger fish!” Akiko hummed, plucking the newspaper out of Ranpo’s hands to read through as well, her eyes skimming the words. “Besides, if you want to meet him, you can.”

“Huh?” Ranpo looked up at her as she began to flip through a few pages and then handed it back to him. She pointed her gloved finger on an ad that looked far more sketchy than it needed to be, but still upheld the professionalism in it.

“They’re celebrating the solved Kira case in Tokyo, and kids below seventeen can participate in some escape room challenge to win ten million yen, while anyone older can challenge L himself. They don’t win anything if they do though, probably just some self pride.”

“Oh that’s perfect!” Ranpo held up the newspaper with a wide grin, disregarding his bag of chips, which was a rare sight to see. He always liked himself a good challenge, regular murder cases were so boring these days. Sometimes Poe would entertain him, but he’d have to wait a long time for each new challenge the writer presented. 

“Oh no, you can’t just disappear off into Tokyo just because you want to,” Kunikida hissed, eyes not leaving his laptop screen, though Ranpo could still feel the glare from across the room. 

“It’s not like I’ll be gone forever, it’s a three day event!” Ranpo protested, thinking of ways he could potentially beat L. Surely the challenge would be based off of L’s past cases, or a slight reference to them at least, so it shouldn’t be all that difficult.

“What’s an escape room?” Kenji piped up from his seat. He was barely educated on how the city works, much less know what a simulation game room was.

“Is it a room with closing walls you have to escape from? One set with traps?” Kyouka asked as well, just a little intrigued. 

“As fun as that sounds, that’s not how it works,” Dazai smiled, making a bridge with his hands and resting his chin on them. “It’s just a room filled with puzzles and you’re supposed to solve them to get out. If you lose, nothing happens. No chances of dying.” He said the last bit with a disappointed sigh, and everyone in the room could tell he must be imagining a death in an escape room and how “grand” it would be. 

“Is it fun?” Kyouka blinked, definitely more interested now.

“I’ve never been in one, but from the looks of it, yeah.”

She whipped her head towards Ranpo, and it seemed as if she was sending a telepathic message to him with those big round eyes of hers, mouth slightly ajar in a silent gasp. “Can I go?” She seemed to have said. Kenji looked the same, though not as obvious. He was more so smiling in a way that said, “Hey you better take me!”

“Oh no! None of you are going anywhere. Even if you do go, Ranpo can’t take you two by himself since he’s clearly not responsible enough,” Kunikida frowned, eye twitching at the detective, who was rereading the article on L one more time in the newspaper. “And you can’t take any more of us with you to keep watch, because then that would make four people absent in the agency, which would be a problem if we get attacked.” 

“It’s cool, I’ll take Poe with me then,” Ranpo reached into his chip bag, munching loudly on purpose just to annoy Kunikida. 

Kunikida spluttered, slamming his laptop shut and storming across the room, snatching the newspaper away, “You can’t go.”

“Aw, am I too important to this agency?” Ranpo purred, taking another chip. “But Kenji and Kyouka really want to go, y’know? They’ve never been to a cool event like this before. Are you really going to crush their hearts?”

“Oooooh,” Dazai dragged, adding fuel to the fire. “Kunikida, you’ll make Kyouka cry!” Kyouka barely looked upset, but her eyes stayed round with hope. 

“I’m just being realistic here!” Kunikida huffed, hands on his hips and side eyeing Kenji, who hadn’t changed from his terrifying smile yet. 

“Realistically boring,” Ranpo coughed into his fist.

The man looked between the two, who were both shooting condescending grins at him, and he threw his hands in the air, going back to his seat. “Fine, do whatever. But if something bad happens, it’ll be on you.” He always did have a very small soft spot for innocent children. 

Ranpo cheered and so did Kenji, and the detective was already making a phone call to Poe to tell him about the news. Kyouka shot a soft smile at the two, before dipping her head slightly at Kunikida in thanks.

* * *

“We’re meeting L.” Mello finally said after a long period of silence. “We’re meeting. L.”

“You don’t have to repeat yourself, we heard you,” Near mumbled, one knee pressed against his chest and the other dangling off his seat. 

“Aren’t you the least bit excited, Near? My mind is literally exploding right now!” Matt pressed his hands on his seat between his legs, leaning forward to glance at Near, who sat on Mello’s right. “Actually, is there even the need for code names now? Can’t we just--”

He was quickly interrupted by an older man, who had opened the door beside him, “You may enter now.”

The three looked between themselves, staring at the door with their own version of anticipation, before slowly getting up and walking towards the door.

“Oh, so you really can walk, I always thought you were carried everywhere you went,” Matt snorted, glancing over at Near to clear his own mood. “With you looking like a baby.”

Near didn’t blink, he wasn’t amused or offended, he just stared.

“Ooookay then, let’s go!” Matt turned back to the door, with him being the first to trail inside. He didn’t expect for L to already be in there, and there was a slight feeling in his chest that told him that maybe L didn’t actually come in person and they were just going to be staring at a computer screen again. 

He was fortunately proven wrong when he came face to face with a painfully pale looking man with heavy eyebags and mussed up hair, fiddling with a fork between his fingers. 

“That’s...L?” Mello said, rather baffled. He had a different idea of how the guy looked like, but he tried to hide his surprise, though a slight tilt of L’s head showed that he had failed tremendously.

Matt’s jaw fell open, before stumbling over to Near, ignoring the angry grunt from Mello when he nudged him aside, and gripped Near’s cheeks. “You.” Matt said, then turning to L. “You.”

“Would you pleashe let my fashe go,” Near pulled at Matt’s hands, voice muffled from his cheeks being pressed together. “Thish is bery rude to L.”

“But, you two look...are you guys secretly brothers?” Matt said in a low voice, slowly letting go of Near’s face, though still leaving them there for unknown reasons.

“Dude, he’s right there,” Mello gestured, slapping Matt’s hands off Near’s face. 

“No no, this is amusing. We aren't related though,” L said, poking his fork at another strawberry. “Do you know why you’re meeting me?”

“You want us to partake in the escape room, to further challenge our intelligence,” Near mumbled, pressing the front of his left foot against the back of his right shin and pinched a strand of his hair. “But also discover any other child within our IQ range.”

L smiled, and it was small, making Near flush a little from pride. 

“That doesn’t exactly explain why you’re here in person, not that I’m complaining,” Mello squinted, arms folded and the gears turning in his head. 

“Lately I’ve been more confident in appearing in person, and I’ve decided it’s the least I could do to you three before I tell you to go out on this small mission of mine,” L bit into another strawberry, chewing slowly. “Just know it’s not all too important, so it’s fine if you come back empty handed. You can decide how you want to go about testing the other children.”

“So in short...you’re taking us out to have fun at this big event with other kids?” Matt grinned widely, excited at the idea of mingling with other children that aren’t just his rivals. 

L paused, looking away and pressing his knees closer to his chest, “If you wish to think it as that.”

Matt made an unintelligent noise, immediately turning to Mello for a hug, only to be dismissed with a hard shove.

“Oi, hands off.” Mello growled.

* * *

“Zombieman was supposed to take me, but he got caught up with work,” Doutei said, arms crossed and huffing angrily in his seat. He was a child, he was allowed to be angry at small matters like these. Though, to Doutei, this wasn’t much of a small matter. It was a big one. His father figure just cancelled on taking him to the big Kira escape room event, which was happening in two days. 

When Doutei saw the announcement on the papers a few weeks ago, Zombieman had promised to take him there, but ended up filling his schedule right on the days when the event was happening. He didn’t do it on purpose though, it just sort of happened. 

“I’m right here, you don’t have to complain so loud,” Zombieman sighed, an uncomfortable smile spreading across his lips.

Doutei immediately stopped pouting, realizing how immature he was sounding. Sitting on his chair, he kicked his feet and swung them, mumbling, “I just...really wanted to go. But it’s okay if you can’t take me.”

“What’s so cool about it anyways?” Saitama asked, cheek resting on his palm. “I think my brothers in Seasoning City are going with their boyfriends, I might go too just to meet them.”

Doutei nearly said it, but he didn’t, and Genos could tell he really wanted to. He wanted to ask if Saitama could take him, but the two barely knew each other, so it would be awkward if he did.

“The greatest detective arranged the escape room, and I want to see if I can beat it…” Doutei said slowly, ignoring the fact that, out loud, it sounded like a pretty dumb reason for him wanting to go. 

“Hmm,” Saitama hummed and a silence fell upon them for a moment before Saitama finally spoke up. “I can take you. Otouto-kun really likes meeting heroes. Nearly lost his shit when he saw Genos for the first time.”

“R-Really?” Doutei smiled, then turned to Zombieman, as if asking for permission. The other gave him a simple nod and Doutei threw his hands up in the air, his hidden kiddish nature coming out in a form of a short cheer. 

“Kid needs a break anyways,” Zombieman said, not particularly directing it at anyone.

* * *

“You only want us to go because you know we’ll somehow win the escape room and get the prize money, then you’re going to bargain with us and say how you’re the one that took us there and make it sound like you deserve a bit of the money.” Ritsu deadpanned, arms crossed, one leg over the other and leaning back against the couch with the sternest look Reigen had ever seen.

“He’s not wrong,” Teru whispered and Reigen scoffed at how fast the kids were turning on him just because Ritsu made sense. 

“Honestly, it’s not the first time he has done this.”

“Can’t you guys just be happy that I so nicely invited you guys to go to that Kira event?” Reigen frowned, glossing his eyes over the four kids. 

“Shou’s mom is literally paying half the fee and she isn’t even coming.” Ritsu retorted. 

“Do you honestly live to hate me?”

Ritsu smirked, tilting his head up, which was a definite yes for Reigen. 

Shigeo fiddled with his fingers, not quite paying attention. “Nii-san is going.” He said offhandedly, which briefly stopped Ritsu from his angry beatdown at Reigen. “And I think an escape room sounds fun, regardless if there’s a prize or not.”

“Yeah, Ritsu, what’s so bad about giving our prize money to Reigen? If you want anything, I can buy it for you!” Shou smiled, draping himself over the boy. 

“Ugh, that’s not my point!” Ritsu flushed, leaning into the contact. “But whatever, I’ll go.”

“Great!” Reigen clapped his hands together, standing up. “They never said there was a rule against the use of psychic powers!”

“Reigen…” Shigeo frowned, knowing fully well that using psychic powers would technically be cheating.

“Kidding! But if you want to…” Reigen whistled, looking away.

“Unbelievable!” Ritsu groaned.

* * *

“I know it’s a three day event, but Kunikida says you only got two,” Atsushi leaned against the door frame, watching Kyouka pack. “Stick close to Poe and Ranpo, I wish I could come with but--”

“You don’t have to worry so much about me,” Kyouka zipped her bag and pushed it against the wall for tomorrow morning. She wasn’t annoyed, but she really didn’t want Atsushi fretting over a small trip, she was more than capable of handling herself.

Atsushi, on the other hand, was always in charge of keeping Kyouka in check and safe, so for her to be far away from his watch was a bit concerning for him. He walked into the room and turned the lights off, then opened the closet and scooted inside where his futon was, “Sorry, I’m just…”

Kyouka made herself comfortable on her futon, pulling her covers up to her torso, “You’re like...my dad. But...less.”

Atsushi paused, blinking hard and slow to understand what she just said, “So like, a brother?”

“Not like Naomi and Tanizaki of course, but yeah,” Kyouka stared at the ceiling, letting her eyes fall shut. “I never had a brother so...I wouldn’t know. If it’s anything like this, then I’m glad I didn’t have one.”

“Why would you say that?” Atsushi asked, feeling slightly hurt.

“If I had a brother, he would’ve gone through the same things as I did. I wouldn’t want that for him,” Kyouka yawned, snuggling her pillow. “You can be my brother if you want.”

Then there was silence and Kyouka was sleeping, leaving Atsushi to stare at her in the dark with a mixture of endearment and love. 

They had breakfast together in the morning, and they didn’t talk about the conversation they had last night. Kyouka seemed like she had no memory of the incident, but Atsushi had it burned into his mind. A sister. Despite being surrounded by children all his life in the orphanage, he never had anyone to call a sister before.

They went to work together and only parted ways at the entrance of the agency, where Kenji, Ranpo, and Poe were waiting. She waved Atsushi goodbye and with a small smile, “Bye, Nii-san.”

And then Atsushi spontaneously combusted.

* * *

Taking a plane from England to Japan had caused the three to have a bit of jet lag, so they didn't get much sleep. Instead of trying to sleep, the three mostly talked in the dark in their beds, their conversations mostly about themselves. They fell asleep pretty late after that, with Near being the first to drift off.

“Must we really be there this early?” Mello rubbed his eyes, taking a seat at the table to have breakfast. Near climbed onto his seat, hugging a pretty ugly looking plush and looking all the same as tired as Mello.

Matt was the only one that looked awake, jamming on the buttons of his console with intense concentration, before pausing and reaching into his jacket pocket, taking out a chocolate bar. Mello immediately perked up and leaned forward with interest.

Matt grinned, unwrapping the treat and breaking off a piece, “Think fast!” And threw it. 

The chair scraped against the floorboard as Mello stood up to catch the piece with his mouth, earning himself a tired three claps from Near.

“You shouldn’t have chocolate as breakfast,” Near mumbled out, cheek pressing his knee.

“Too bad, I like chocolate. You should try some.” Mello opened his mouth once more and Matt tossed another piece.

“Goal!” Matt cheered.

“Ugh, no thanks,” Near stuck his tongue out a little. “Too sweet.”

“This is why we never get along,” Mello wrinkled his nose and blinked in surprise when a chocolate piece bounced off the side of his head. He turned back to Matt, baring his teeth. “Asshole! I wasn’t ready!”

“Eat it off the table,” Matt snorted, a twinkle of mischief in his eyes. 

“Don’t,” Near squished the arms of his plush without much thought.

Mello dipped his head down and picked the piece up with his teeth before gulping it down, just to annoy Near, who barely looked phased by the action. 

The three hadn’t been friends for long, they’ve seen each other along the hallways, but that was it. They didn’t interact with each other much due to the fact that they recognized each other as rivals. Well, on Mello’s part anyways. Near was normally shy and Matt had the tendency to get bored too fast. The first time they really did properly talk was after meeting L, and it was a surprise how they clicked pretty fast.

“Breakfast is here! Race you!” Matt suddenly stood up and bolted, holding the chocolate up as if to tempt Mello into actually racing him. Which worked because Mello was already right on the other’s tail. 

“Guuuys,” Near stood up slowly, trudging over to the trays with his plush still in hand.

* * *

“Do you seriously have everything in that little school bag of yours?” Saitama poked on the black bag Doutei was carrying. The little boy’s eyebrow shot up from irritation and took a step back, gripping the straps tight.

“Yeah, I do. I doubt we’ll actually stay for three days straight, I’m aiming for two.” Doutei said, waiting for the train to arrive. “If you want to stay longer, I can get home myself. I just need an adult to accompany me inside.”

“That makes sense,” Saitama scratched his chin and stared at the train tracks before letting his eyes drift up to the blue sky. It really was a nice day out. “Hey, Genos, do you think I’ll bump into my brothers on the train?”

“Excited to see your brothers?” Genos asked, calculating the chances at the same time. 

“Been a while, I suppose,” Saitama chuckled. Honestly, he just wanted to see the look on Ritsu’s face when he sees Doutei with him. 

“There’s a 78% chance, considering how large the train is and the time they take it,” Genos finally answered. Right on cue, the train pulled up at the station, and as they stepped inside, they found four boys and a very tired looking adult sitting near the door.

“Oh, hi Tama,” Reigen blinked, eyes slightly drooping from exhaustion. Saitama grinned and couldn't believe his luck. He was fully prepared to just look for them during the event, to be honest.

“Hi Taka.” Saitama waved, taking a seat that was next to theirs. Genos and Doutei followed suit, with Genos sitting next to Saitama near the window seat and Doutei sitting across them.

“Holy shit is that Child Emperor?!” Ritsu was vibrating with excitement, gripping onto Shou and shaking him. “It’s Child Emperor, Shou. Do you see this!?”

“Why are you so infatuated with heroes,” Shou huffed, not seeing the big deal about the little kid with the school backpack. “That’s just a kid.”

“That’s what Child Emperor implies, yes,” Ritsu deadpanned. 

“So your brothers are...that one,” Doutei pointed at Ritsu, then pointed at Shigeo. “And that one.”

Saitama nodded, grinning at Shigeo, who was busy chatting with Teru to notice his surroundings. He seemed happy, a great improvement from the last time Saitama visited. When Shigeo finally saw Saitama, his eyes had literally sparkled and he stood up to give Saitama a hug.

Teru watched with lovestruck eyes as Shigeo began saying how much he missed Saitama. They were talking about the older brother earlier, so it made sense why Shigeo seemed happier than usual meeting Saitama again. 

“By the way, you can relax with my hero name. Like, y’know, ‘Doutei’.” He said, the pitch and tone in ‘Child Emperor’ were dropped to a lazy and relaxed ‘Doutei’. If that made sense in English.

“Is Tama-niisan just friends with all the cool heroes at this point?” Ritsu sighed with a mixture of exasperation and fascination. 

“Yes.” Genos quickly answered as a fact.

Ritsu puffed his cheeks, just a little, and fell back against Shou for comfort. “So I’m guessing you wanna try out for the escape room?”

“As a fun challenge for myself, yeah,” Doutei replied, plucking on his bag straps. “You?”

“Oh we’re in it for the money,” Shou beamed widely, side-eying Reigen in the process. 

“Lay off, Shou,” Reigen groaned. “Don’t paint me as the bad guy here!”

“Aha. You said it, not me!”

Doutei wasn’t sure what to make of Saitama’s family, they sure were livelier than the hero was. He could see the family resemblance between Shigeo, Ritsu, and Saitama, but their personalities sort of varied in a way. At most Doutei could deduce was that Saitama and Shigeo were more alike than Ritsu.

Then suddenly he blinked rapidly and his eyes widened, because he wasn’t sure if he was seeing things right, because he just saw Shou use _telekinesis_ right in front of his eyes. Shou was definitely doing it to show off, but regardless, Doutei was stunned.

 _Wait does that mean--_ Doutei glanced at the other three kids.

“Oh, yeah, we all do. We all can do that,” Teru said, catching Doutei’s wandering eyes. 

Doutei didn’t know what to do with that information, and he slowly looked over at Saitama.

“I can’t, don’t worry,” Saitama said, noticing Doutei’s shock as well.

Huh.

* * *

“Bullet trains really are something huh, Kyouka?” Kenji grinned, resting his hands on his knees as he swayed from side to side. The girl blinked at the sudden attention and slowly nodded, peeling her eyes off the window.

“It’s not my first time, but they’re nice,” Kyouka agreed, trying to keep up with the small talk. She never properly got to know Kenji despite the both of them being the same age, and she felt like that was pretty odd of the both of them to do, so they might as well start a friendship now when they had the chance.

“I don’t regularly take the train, and my village is too small to have one,” Kenji said, then he went on to talk about his personal past life some more and Kyouka found herself listening with interest. She always knew he talked a lot, but this really was more pleasant than annoying, and pretty soothing. 

Meanwhile, Ranpo and Poe were busy with a stack of newspapers surrounding the cases L had solved previously. It may not seem like it, with the way he was lazily flipping through the papers while leaning on Poe’s tall frame, but Ranpo really was serious about beating L in whatever challenge he was going to present.

He told Poe countless times that he wasn’t jealous, but the other was starting to find it hard to believe.

“Greatest detective my ass,” Ranpo mumbled under his breath, solving yet another case within a few lines into the newspaper. He reached for the article that wrote about that case being solved, and yet again, he got it right. 

“Ranpo, even if L does turn out better--”

“He is not!”

“--you shouldn’t feel too upset.” Poe finished, blatantly ignoring Ranpo’s fussy protests. “No one’s making it a competition.”

“Calling him the greatest one already makes it a competition!” Ranpo retorted. 

“Well that’s sorta true but--”

Ranpo gripped Poe’s shirt and pulled him down, flustering the taller man, and pressed his forehead against Poe’s, “But I am better.”

“Okay now you just sound like a prideful jerk.”

Ranpo huffed, not letting Poe go, “I can’t not kiss you.”

Poe responded by making a weird gurgling noise in his throat, and he was pretty sure his temperature had risen several degrees higher. So, as the obvious reaction, Ranpo pecked Poe on the lips and went back to reading. 

“Oh.” Kyouka said, having to just witness that brief flirting scene. She didn’t hear what they were saying, but the kiss was not too hard to miss.

“You never noticed? I guess it was hard to notice. I wonder how it feels.” Kenji smiled, humming as he stopped swaying. “To be in love.”

Kyouka turned her head back to Kenji, and he kept smiling, his question too genuine for underlying tones. But it really seemed so cliche.

“I wonder too.” She said, mostly because it was the natural response. It was either that, or more blinking and confusion.

* * *

“They really put a lot of money into making this, huh?” Mello chewed on his chocolate, gazing at the entrance of the event through the window of the car the three of them were in. “Makes you think if they had this idea since the beginning.”

“Unlikely,” Near quickly shot, sitting in his usual way with twirling his hair with his finger. 

“It did take a few weeks for them to organize this, there’s no way they didn’t have the idea in the back of their mind during Kira’s reign of terror,” Matt mumbled, yet again pressing away on his console. Then he leaned over at Mello, mouth ajar and expecting the other to let him take a bite out of the chocolate.

He stayed like that for a while and Mello had half a mind to shove Matt off, but that would mean he might crush Near in the process and that wouldn’t end well, considering Near might drop his bag of precious toys. So reluctantly, Mello let Matt take a bite.

“Ugh, Near was right, this is too sweet.” Matt scrunched his face up, but swallowed the chocolate anyways.

“Then why did you want a taste?!” Mello growled.

“Curious on how your mouth must taste like twenty-four-seven.”

Mello blinked and Near scooted a few centimetres away from Matt, pressing himself against the car door.

“Oh shove off,” Mello grunted, facing back towards the window and took another bite out of his chocolate. 

“I was kidding. Come on, you two. Seriously,” Matt glanced between the two boys, both avoiding eye contact with him.

“Dry humor,” Near simply said.

“You wound me.”

* * *

“I’m guessing we booked in the same hotel?” Reigen said, noticing how the three heroes were walking with them. Saitama glanced over at Genos, who had the inner GPS, and reinforced the question with a quirk of his eyebrow.

“I was going to room with the boys, maybe sleep on the floor while they share beds, but since Doutei is here…” Reigen said, trailing off to give the other two adults an idea of what he was saying.

“Oh so you want to sorta switch rooms so it’s less awkward?” Saitama looked down at Doutei, who seemed a little offended that he wasn’t included in the adult conversation, and asked, “You okay with that? Sleeping in the same room as those four.”

Doutei glanced over at the four espers, and he was pretty sure the aura of chaotic energy around them all came from that one person; Shou. He wasn’t sure if he could handle that much action in his life.

“We don’t...snore…?” Shigeo said, hoping that would convince Doutei, which made the child laugh a little. Snoring was Doutei’s last worry at the moment. 

“Sometimes Ritsu grinds his teeth when he’s stressed,” Shou blurted out, earning himself a hard smack from his boyfriend.

“Don’t tell him that!” Ritsu fumed, color rising into his cheeks.

“He was bound to know anyways,” Shou laughed.

“If you’re worried about Shou, I can handle him for you,” Teru winked, charming as ever and a habit of his that he will never drop. 

“No one can contain me!” Shou yelled, causing a few passer-bys to look his way with concern.

“Squirrel!” Teru pointed at the sky randomly, where no trees were found at all.

“Where?” Shou looked up.

“Gotcha.”

Doutei sighed, running a hand through his hair. He couldn’t do it, but Reigen was right, it would be much better if he roomed with them than those two lovebirds. So weighing his options, he ended up agreeing to staying with the four of those boys. At least with them, he won’t be restricting Genos and Saitama from their subtle-but-sometimes-not-subtle flirting.

* * *

“Y’know, it hasn’t crossed my mind that Kyouka is the only girl here,” Ranpo finally said once they arrived at the front of the hotel. The event didn’t start until in about a few hours, so they were just going to put their stuff down, grab something to eat, and prepare themselves for the challenge. “How many rooms did we book again?”

“Two…” Poe looked at Kenji and Kyouka. “With one bed. Each room.”

“It’s okay, I can sleep on the floor,” Kenji offered, smiling widely as always. He really didn’t mind, he had slept in far more uncomfortable places before back in his village. 

“I’m more used to sleeping on floors though,” Kyouka said, offering to take the floor as well. 

“A girl like you really shouldn’t--”

“Why can’t you two just share a bed?” Ranpo folded his arms, as if the solution was obvious and Poe did a double take, staring at Ranpo.

“I don’t think that’s...good, they’re...are you two straight?” Poe turned to the two children. He felt a bit bad for not thinking ahead, but he had taken up more commissions and work than normal just to have enough money to pay for the trip with Ranpo, so it never once crossed his mind either. 

“I like girls,” Kenji shrugged, and he was sure of himself for that.

“Yes.” Kyouka answered without a thought. “I’ll sleep on the floor, it’s okay.”

“Neither of you kids should sleep on the floor.” The four suddenly turned to the newcomer who who had just spoken. Ranpo’s eyebrow twitched, nearly yelling at him that it’s rude to butt into other people’s conversation, but the person looked serious with the way he was looking at them, so Ranpo kept his mouth sealed shut to hear what the new guy had to say.

Reigen had grown caring towards children after years of being surrounded by Shigeo, so when he had accidentally eavesdropped on their conversation while walking towards the hotel, he couldn’t help but leave his input on the situation. 

“Yeah, okay, but you got a better idea then?” Ranpo finally snapped, hands on his hips.

“Taka don’t--” Saitama knew what Reigen was going to say next, but failed to stop the man in time.

“We can switch rooms, we have two beds. The boy can take a bed and you two can share, the girl can have the room to herself,” Reigen suggested, as if the idea was already in his mind from the start. “We don’t mind, right Tama?”

Saitama shrugged. On one hand, the money issue behind the rooms would make the switch complicated, on the other, Reigen didn’t look like he was going to take ‘no’ for an answer. When he failed to answer in time, Doutei sighed, pinching the bridge of his nose.

“Alright alright, okay!” Saitama said before Doutei could say anything. He was sure the kid was going to say ‘no’ for him, and he didn’t exactly want that. “But,” Saitama leaned closer to Reigen so he could whisper to him, “don’t they only have one bed?”

“We’ll cross that bridge when we get there,” Reigen grinned. Saitama frowned at the answer, since said bridge was going to be crossed in about eleven hours. 

“I’m sorry we’ve caused you so much trouble,” Poe bowed slightly. He wasn’t fully familiar with Japanese culture, but he knew bowing would be the right thing to do at the moment. Reigen softened, only a little, at the gesture and waved his hands dismissively. 

“No problem, really! As long as the young lady is comfortable!”

Saitama glanced at Genos, who hadn’t said anything about the situation yet, and he wondered if the cyborg was just silent because he didn’t want to argue with Reigen. As it turned out, it was because Kenji and Kyouka were wide-eyed at staring at him, which was making Genos just an ounce uncomfortable.

The hero was used to being stared at, but Genos really had nowhere else to look but forward, which was where the two kids were, so they were having a pretty awkward eye contact session.

Before the two could even get the chance to start asking questions about Genos, Reigen immediately walked into the hotel so they could check into their rooms and make some changes, even if they couldn’t due to the hotel’s policy, they were going to do it anyway. Which wouldn’t be a problem at all for Ranpo honestly.

“I’m guessing you two are going to the Kira event as well?” Teru asked while waiting for the adults to settle the room switching and booking in.

“Was it that obvious, ha ha?” Kenji chuckled, picking on his strawhat’s string around his neck. 

“It makes sense, I feel like this event is going to be big,” Teru ndded. He had a small feeling they were going to be seeing each other often, so they might as well befriend each other now than meet again awkwardly at the event later. “You guys going to grab lunch before the event starts?”

“Yeah.”

Teru smiled in his usual charming way that would make anyone swoon, which was why Kyouka flushed just a little when he did. “Maybe we can eat together, if you’re going to use the hotel’s cafe of course.”

“I hope they have something sweet,” Kyouka said softly. “Like crepes.”

“Oh! And cake!” Doutei grinned widely, bouncing on his feet.

“Beef cutlet rice…” Kenji sighed.

“Ramen,” Shigeo whispered softly.

“Omelette rice.” Ritsu added.

All seven kids felt their stomach rumbled, and Shou doubled over laughing, “Oh we’re going to be great friends! The name’s Suzuki Shou, but Shou is just fine. Now what do you think about fires?”

They only got as far as to introducing themselves before being told that they could head to their rooms now, so the two groups began making their way to the elevators so they could put their things down in their rooms and head for lunch. 

When they all went down for lunch, they had to break into two groups, adults and children, since the kids wanted to hang out longer. They took up a particularly large booth and Ritsu and Shou volunteered to order their food at the counter for the rest, so while the others waited, they made small talk.

“You’re from Yokohama?” Doutei asked. He was still carrying around his school bag in case of emergencies, and the only thing he left behind were pretty much just clothes and his hygiene necessities. “I heard there’s like...a mafia there.”

“Shame that Kira didn’t target them,” Kyouka mumbled, and for a moment, Doutei wondered if she was being serious. Her expressions were alike to Shigeo’s, they both barely showed any emotions until they were feeling _a lot_ , which wasn’t helpful when Doutei wanted to know what they were feeling exactly at the moment. 

“They’re pretty secretive, aren’t they?” Doutei smiled nervously, not quite agreeing with her. She hummed in response, just to acknowledge that the boy had spoken.

“Dude, if the government hadn’t told the media to keep a shush about my dad and all, he could’ve been dead by now,” Shou laughed, walking back to them when he was done ordering with Ritsu. Doutei didn’t know if that was a laughing matter, not to mention he needed context to understand what the ginger had meant by that.

But when Shou didn’t indulge them any further, Doutei took it as it was that much of a secret. 

Meanwhile, the vibe between the adults was sort of tense. Ranpo and Poe were huddled to themselves, trying to predict what L’s challenge would be, while Saitama, Reigen, and Genos continued to catch up with each other. They weren’t exactly mingling, and Ranpo wanted it to stay that way.

Something about Reigen made Ranpo uncomfortable, perhaps it was the maturity that Reigen radiated that made him anxious. He had an authoritative aura. Like…

Fukuzawa. 

Ranpo blinked. Maybe that was why he felt weird, an odd feeling to hold back his retorts, not to go too far with his words. He was still loose around the director, sure, but he always knew where the line was. Plus, Reigen did seem like the ultimate father figure, though he could never compare to Fukuzawa of course.

Reigen, on the other hand, found the two detectives quite endearing. They reminded him of Serizawa and him, and he inwardly sighed, wishing he could’ve taken his fiance with him on this trip, but that would leave no one in the office. Unlike the hot springs, this wasn’t a business job, so he couldn’t just take whoever he wanted to.

“Saitama, the event starts in an hour,” Genos reminded mid conversation, making Ranpo perk up and glance at Poe, who checked his watch to confirm that Genos was right. 

“Y’know, I doubt it’s fair for a cyborg to take part in,” Ranpo suddenly said, resting his chin on his hand and his elbow on the table. He waved his takoyaki around before plopping it into his mouth, then pointed the toothpick at Genos. “You’re not taking part, are you?” 

“The three of us aren’t all that interested, we’re here because the kids wanted to come,” Reigen replied for Genos, noticing that an argument might start between them. He could tell Ranpo was probably an arrogant sort of person, and he guessed that the detective must’ve came because he wanted to prove he was better than L or something. 

“Sure,” Ranpo said, standing up and walking over to the kids. That was enough conversation with Reigen. “Let’s go! It starts in about an hour, I want to be there early.”

“Well isn’t that a first,” Poe mumbled under his breath, but loud enough for Ranpo to hear.

“Shush.”

Kyouka and Kenji both looked up, and Poe could tell they looked a bit disappointed that they had to part with their new friends. 

“Are you guys going to leave as well?” Kyouka asked, hoping that maybe they would say yes. Shigeo blinked, turned to look at Reigen, who shrugged a little before nodding.

“Yeah, sure, we can go together,” Shigeo smiled softly.

Ranpo huffed, rather irritated, but said nothing when they all began to gather their things to leave.

* * *

“Don’t you think it would be odd for us to just keep calling each other by our nicknames?” Matt suddenly spoke, sitting in the waiting room where the escape room challenge would be held upstairs. He was still playing on his gaming console, even though three hours had already gone by. 

Of course, they weren’t just sitting there during those three hours, they met up with L again to test his challenge, which they found was really creative yet risky. They wondered if he had grown overconfident for him to make this challenge, but didn’t question it out loud. Then they had a short briefing about how they should act, the basic rules. The only thing they weren’t allowed to do was reveal that they came from the Wammy’s house, and they were encouraged to stick with their nicknames with strangers, other than that, they were free to make up their own rules.

“Good try, Matt, but I ain’t telling you shit,” Mello was already on his fourth chocolate bar, and each time he unwrapped a new one, Near cringed. 

“As much as I enjoy your company, I’d rather not,” Near hummed, squishing his little rubber finger puppets that oddly resembled the three of them and L. 

“Okay, then I’ll tell you first, how about it?” Matt said, kicking Near gently, who was sitting on the floor to have a bigger play area with his toys. 

Near frowned, swatting Matt’s leg away, “Don’t.”

“My name’s--”

“Don’t do it, Matt,” Mello warned, for once agreeing with the boy on the floor.

“--upsexy.”

Near straightened up with minor confusion, thought for a minute, then widened his eyes and went back to playing. Mello took note of his reaction, though he still remained confused. Was that really Matt’s name?

“What kind of name is that? What’s up..sexy…” Mello nearly dropped his chocolate bar, or maybe he might’ve crushed it with his fist. Matt finally placed his console down, pointing at Mello and laughed so hard his stomach began to hurt. Mello growled and considered flipping over the coffee table to crush Matt, but with Near in the way, he couldn’t. “You freaking asshole!”

“I can’t believe it.”

“I hate you.”

“Not once,” Matt wheezed. “Not once has that ever worked. I can’t believe you actually…I mean, Near noticed!”

Mello flushed, his free hand curled into a tight fist and he gritted his teeth, “Shut up.”

“But to answer your question,” Matt wiped a tear away, going back to playing on his console. “Nothing much, what’s up with you?”

“I will strangle you to death, I swear to god,” Mello threatened, angrily biting off a big chunk of his chocolate.

“Ahh, nooo, Near protect me!” Matt feigned terror, curling up with his console held tightly to his chest.

“No.” Near shifted himself so that he was lying on his belly now, which also meant that if Mello was to jump Matt at that moment, Near wouldn’t be blocking him.

Which was why Mello took that opportunity and jumped onto Matt.

Near dipped his head down when he anticipated a kick from Matt’s leg and continued to mind his own business as Mello pulled on Matt’s cheeks, not wanting to actually hurt the boy. They were mostly pinching each other at this point, but it got real serious when Mello slipped and stepped on Near’s hand.

“Ow!” Near hissed, rolling over and sitting up, shooting Mello a furrowed look. 

“Oooooh, Mello made Near cr--” Matt was shushed by a hard shove on the face and Mello slipped off him, dropping to the floor with his legs crossed.

“I’m not crying,” Near frowned, rubbing his hand. It wasn’t broken or anything, the step wasn’t hard enough to leave a bruise or a scratch, maybe a small one, but it wasn’t too serious. 

Mello huffed, nearly yanking Near’s hand, instead he took it as gently as possible and brushed his thumb over the red spot where his shoe had accidentally dug into. “Sorry.”

“I’m sorry too, I was totally using you as my meat shield earlier,” Matt shifted forward in an awkward position so he can meet Near at eye level while also sitting on his chair in an atrocious way. 

“I figured,” Near sniffed as Mello continued to rub the sore spot absentmindedly. 

“We’re having a pretty heart to heart moment, are you going to tell me your real na--”

“No.”

A secretary walked in right when Matt was about to launch some long excuse to convince Near to reveal his true name, and she smiled sweetly, gesturing outside, “The event will begin shortly. You remember what to do, yes?”

“Near’s going to pretend to be L’s brother and we’re all going to pretend we’re participating in the event as guests,” Matt lazily replied, upset that he got interrupted. 

“Then during the escape room, we go as a trio with a group we deem interesting enough,” Mello added. “We monitor them and contribute as little as possible for appropriate results.”

“Bring conflict in to test how well they do under stress, sabotage just a little to see if they notice,” Near finished, eyeing his set of toys to see which one he would rather bring. The finger puppets, the action figures, or the plushies?

“Ah, I was going to say just have fun, but that too, I suppose,” the secretary says, impressed at how serious these children could get sometimes. 

The three exchanged glances, feeling a bit silly now, and nodded. Yeah, that too. They forgot this wasn’t a serious mission.

* * *

“Looks like we aren’t the only ones that are early,” Reigen mumbled, staring at the large crowd outside the entrance of the event. Reigen had expected the Kira to be done in a park or something, but was surprised that the venue led them to a large building that mostly held formal events. 

With no tables, a banquet hall looked a whole lot larger, which sort of intimidated the man. He felt out of place to be here and a quick look at the rest of his group proved that he was the only one that felt that way. He expected a convention hall, not something so formal to be honest.

“They said they’d rather separate the kids participating in the escape room on a different floor than a different room.” Genos mumbled to sort of answer the question on Reigen’s mind. 

“Given that, that means the L challenge is going to take up this whole floor?” Doutei asked, slowly licking his ridiculously large lollipop. 

“A...fake crime scene for us to solve,” Ranpo mumbled, then he pulled out his glasses and pressed it up his nose as they walked inside, which mildly confused Reigen because he wasn’t reading anything at the moment. “Oh...that’s...interesting…”

“What is?” Reigen found himself asking despite knowing Ranpo would probably click his tongue and ignore him. To his surprise, Ranpo did the exact opposite, and Reigen had the small feeling the shorter man just wanted to boast his deducing skills.

“L’s going to have us locate something. He’s going to make it seem like it’s an object, but it’s actually a person,” Ranpo grinned, slowly taking his glasses off once he was finished, stuffing it back into his pocket.

“Chances are it’s going to be him, isn’t it?” Poe said and Ranpo pointed at his boyfriend, nodding deeply. Then for a moment he paused, looking down, then patted at his head. The rest watched as he froze and internally panicked before; “Oh right, he’s with...okay.”

“You talking about Karl?” Ranpo snorted and the taller man blushed in embarrassment. Then the detective turned to the other kids that needed context and whispered loudly, “Karl’s Poe’s pet raccoon.”

“Wicked,” Shou grinned, finding that awfully cute. “I wished you brought him along.”

“I can’t snuggle him in,” Poe frowned, wishing he brought Karl along too.

“Right, as if you’re fantastic at obeying the law,” Ranpo chuckled. The group stuck close as the crowd grew thicker, Ranpo had expected there to be many people, but this crowd was starting to remind him of school when the hallways would fill up with students after the last bell.

Of course, they were still near the entrance, so if they continued on, they’d probably find pockets of empty space to break away into. The banquet could really be compared to a regular convention hall, Ranpo hadn’t realized a place like this could be so large on the inside and look so small on the outside.

“When’s the escape room starting?” Kyouka said, her excitement contained really well, though it sparkled through her eyes. 

“Wait, before you two go, please don’t use your abilities during the escape room. It’s a puzzle solving game, using brute force unless necessary won’t help,” Poe said, bending down slightly to get his message across better. Kyouka and Kenji nodded, they already kinda got that from the beginning, but there was no harm in reinforcing that idea so they won’t accidentally cause an accident. 

“Ah, yeah, Doutei, I’d recommend sticking to what’s given to you in the room. Try not to…” Saitama gestured to his bag and the boy rolled his eyes, adjusting the bag on his back.

“Yeah, I know. Don’t worry,” Doutei reassured, he wasn’t really planning on cheating from the start.

“I know Reigen isn’t gonna say it, but y’all, let’s try to keep the psychic powers to a minimum, alright?” Shou said, swinging back and raising his arms to let out some energy. He was so excited, he was practically buzzing with it. As he took another step back, he heard a loud yell and turned apologetically.

A blonde boy with his hair pulled back in a ponytail snarled at Shou after the sudden bump, “Watch it.” His two other friends, a white-haired boy and a brunette boy both glanced at Shou’s way, but immediately looked away with disinterest.

Shou blinked, a bit offended, and nearly laughed in the blonde’s face if Ritsu hadn’t tugged him back. So instead, he chuckled lightly, “Sorry.”

Mello huffed, about to say more about how unapologetic Shou was, when Near tugged on his leather vest and shook his head. L stared at the interaction, then up at Reigen, who was watching as well.

“You don’t look related,” L pointed after scanning Reigen’s own little group. 

“Actually that one’s my son. Adoptive of course,” Reigen nodded his head at Teru, who snapped his head up, turned to L, and waved hello, before going back to what he was doing. Reigen smiled at the three kids that stuck close to L, “Your brother and his friends?”

L tilted his head, nodding slowly, “Yeah. They mostly came for the escape room.”

“Hey, you’ve got like seven kids with you right? Including your friends? Can we join them? It’d make a perfect ten,” Matt suddenly spoke up and Mello shot him a look that said, “What are you doing?” Matt dismissed this and smiled, waiting for an answer.

“I don’t see why not,” Teru said. “We can check with the others if you’d like, wanna head to the escape room together?”

“Cool, yeah sure,” Matt replied, already dragging Mello and Near along with him.

“Hey, Kenji, Kyouka, we’re going,” Doutei pointed, pulling gently on Kyouka’s kimono. She turned and grabbed Kenji’s hand, pulling him with her so they could leave with the rest. 

“Ranpo, Poe, we’re going! See you later!” Kenji waved goodbye cheerfully and Ranpo took a moment to register it.

“Oh. Okay! Have fun you guys!” Ranpo waved his arms widely. “Okay, now that the kids are gone. Saitama was it?”

The bald man turned to the man that was talking to him, “Hm?”

“What is _up_ with your hoodie and where can I buy one?”

“Ranpo, no,” Poe sighed. He thought he could go through the whole day without Ranpo mentioning the guy’s hoodie.

Ranpo snickered, thinking about Kunikida’s reaction if he were to get one, “It’s a genius hoodie. Seriously. Tits. Ha ha.”

“Please not in public, Ranpo.”

“I knew we should have packed something else,” Genos mumbled, watching Ranpo double over in laughter at the hoodie again.

“Aw, Genos, everyone loves my hoodie,” Saitama tugged on it, smiling softly. “It’s...bold, don’t you think?”

“Yes. Be glad the children are on a different floor.”

Reigen laughed along with his friend and was about to ask for the new guy’s name when he realized the man was already gone. It was strange, to say the least, and Reigen didn’t think much of it until he looked down on the ground and found a small finger puppet toy.

It kinda looked like the kid Shou had bumped into earlier, definitely self made with whatever the kid who had this toy could find. Reigen made a mental note to hand it back to the child later, after deciding that it was probably the kid’s.

* * *

“If I knew you guys were going to go with just nicknames, I wouldn’t have told you my full name,” Teru chuckled and Near looked a bit fascinated everytime Teru spoke, since the boy awfully reminded him of Prince Charming.

Near was a child that enjoyed fairytales and such, but he knew they weren’t real and he couldn’t possibly find a real life version of them that weren’t actors, but now that he met Teru, he wasn’t sure what to do anymore.

“Another one bites the dust,” Ritsu grumbled, watching Teru laugh away when Matt told him something funny about themselves. 

“You make it sound like you weren’t one of the people who bit the dust,” Shou teased and Ritsu turned red, folding his arms. The ginger comforted the raven, giving him an one-armed hug, “Don’t worry, Ritsu, I know Teru can’t help it.”

“Can’t help what?” Teru smiled a smile that perfectly replicated the sunshine, which immediately made Ritsu hiss and cover his eyes.

“I don’t get it,” Doutei squinted at Teru, not seeing the appeal other than the fact that, yes, Teru was naturally handsome. He couldn’t quite grasp the charm that everyone else seemed to be seeing.

“You’ll understand when you’re older,” Shou said, ruffling Doutei’s hair, which made Ritsu flinch. Shou then threw his hands in the air, smiling brightly. “Yes! Finally ruffled someone’s hair that’s shorter than me!”

“Bet you waited a _long_ time, huh?” Doutei deadpanned.

“Is that an insult?”

Shigeo clung onto Teru tight. Although there was a fair balance between people he knew and people he hadn’t met up until today, he was still uncomfortable with the new strangers. He liked Kyouka, Kenji, and Doutei, but they only met today, not to mention the three new strangers as well. 

And he wasn’t stupid, he was pretty sure Kyouka and Near were treating his boyfriend as eyecandy the past few minutes, and he was sure they meant well, but it still made him uneasy. A lot of people admired Teru’s natural aesthetic, Shigeo got that all the time from his highschool. They’d make comments like, “Your boyfriend is a cutie.” and “He’s really charming, isn’t he?” and Shigeo appreciated it, but it was weird.

Teru untangled himself from Shigeo for a moment and rewrapped his arm around Shigeo, resting it around his waist and pulling him closer, mumbling how the previous position was sort of uncomfortable. Shigeo could actually feel his face warming up, but ended up leaning into it anyway.

“Y’know, for a while, I thought you were a girl,” Kenji laughed lightly with a small smile, making Mello’s eyebrow twitch.

“I get that. A lot.” Mello struggled out, forcing out a smile. Act nice now, be mean later.

“Reminds me of Nakahara,” Kyouka mumbled, seeing the resemblance between style and personality. Mello didn’t know if he should take that as a compliment or ask for context, but stopped when Kyouka immediately added, “You both dress nice.”

“Oh.” Mello said, tugging on his leather vest with a small sense of pride. “Thank you.”

“Maybe after this we can go shopping together, I really like your style,” Ritsu laughed, semi-joking. He really did like Mello’s style though. It seemed like something Tsubomi would adore.

Mello wasn’t exactly used to being told that he looked nice, most of the compliments directed at him were about his intelligence, and it got pretty tiring really quickly. Maybe he could really befriend these people, afterall, this wasn’t a proper mission or task of sorts. 

Matt pounded the side of his fist onto his palm, pointing at Doutei with sudden recognition, “You’re that hero kid with the cool whatzits!”

“Um.” Doutei said. Should he feel offended that his inventions were called ‘whatzits’ or appreciated that he was recognized?

“You’re not planning to cheat with your dodats are you?” Seriously, what was up with this kid’s nicknames for the word ‘inventions’?

“No.” Doutei replied bluntly, not wanting to waste his time correcting Matt. He went back to licking his lollipop, having yet to reach its center. 

Once the group of ten kids reached the elevator, where many other children gathered, they waited in line as the lady at the front grouped the kids in front of them into groups of ten before sending them up the elevator to a randomized escape room. There weren’t many children, to be honest, and it made sense since the event was about a serial magical murderer that got arrested.

There were about three or two classrooms worth of kids in line, possibly even more that are playing the escape rooms right now, though definitely not enough to fill a whole school. Unlike the crowd in the banquet hall at the moment.

* * *

As it turned out, Ranpo and Poe were right about the challenge, though they could bet that no one else could guess the thing, or in this case, the person they were looking for was L. The message played on the gigantic screen and speakers left clues like it was a scavenger hunt, though was vague about what exactly they were supposed to look for.

Most could’ve thought L was talking about an object, since they were given the impression that the message was recorded live, but Ranpo knew it was pre recorded from the way the man had to take longer than usual to pull the message up.

Ranpo could give some people the benefit of the doubt that they, too, might’ve made the assumption he did, but now it was a race to see who could find L the fastest, and Ranpo was going to win.

He unfolded his glasses with one swift movement and put them on, working his brain to the maximum. It wasn’t like his Super Deduction could give Ranpo a clear cut of how L looked like, but it definitely could point him in the right direction on where to start looking first. 

Going against L’s first clue in searching the hallways for the next clue, he walked towards the bathroom, with Poe trailing behind him.

“Ranpo, he said--” Poe started, but was shushed by the man who had a shit eating grin on.

“I’m going to win this.”

Ranpo entered the bathroom after speed walking towards there, he kicked open the first stall, which was closed despite the lock indicating vacant, and pointed forward like he had caught the culprit…

Only to find no one.

“What,” Ranpo instantly paled, stepping inside with disbelief. Was he wrong? No, this was just like that cannibalism ability case. L must’ve anticipated that Ranpo would find him out and counteracted. Ranpo returned back to grinning, though a little annoyed if he was being honest. “Oh, oh he’s actually good.”

“Are you sure you’re just not blinded by jealous rage?” Poe whispered, not that he was questioning his boyfriend’s methods. But...they _were_ standing in a bathroom and away from where they were supposed to be. Then Poe watched with widened eyes as Ranpo lifted the tank’s lid off the toilet and flipped it over to find a plastic card taped on the underside of the lid.

“I’m sure you thought you would find me here and I congratulate you for that as this was my initial hiding spot idea, but I decided to have a bit more fun. Good luck.” Ranpo slowly read out loud for Poe to hear. He placed the lid back and washed his hands at the sink, thinking about the card. “He doesn’t want me taking shortcuts, does he? There’s no way this whole scavenger hunt thing will actually lead me to him fast enough and he knows that. This challenge is rigged to his advantage, yet still possible if you’re smart enough.”

The Ranpo turned to Poe, pointing a wet finger at him, “Help me out here, we’re going to have to think together on this one.”

“A-Are you sure?” Poe stared, pointing at himself. If Ranpo was asking for his help on this one, then this challenge truly was too difficult, even for him. He was going to be useless!

“Just need your input, babe, don’t worry too much,” Ranpo smiled softly as Poe calmed down a little.

“Ah, uh, hm. If he managed to predict you would skip the steps and find him immediately, then he must have assumed you’re a hard thinker too.” Poe thought back to the many mystery books he read, where the plot would drive him in circles and distract him from the obvious conclusion. “He’s probably expecting you to overthink.”

“Then the answer should be easy,” Ranpo nodded. To be honest, he really was fully prepared to go on a wild goose chase for L, over analyze the tiny details and such, and he was slightly disappointed to learn that it wasn’t going to be as fun as he had expected. The card definitely was some sort of trigger that made him feel hyped, it felt like L himself was challenging him, leading him down some rabbit hole. Sure, it would probably satisfy Ranpo’s amusement, but he’d never get the conclusion he wants.

Which was why he made the good call to ask for Poe’s input, to slow himself down a bit, because no one’s better at taking a pause and reading back than a writer. 

Ranpo pushed his glasses up and took a deep breath, then flashed them open and reanalyzed the situation he was in, ignoring some parts that would’ve led him down the matryoshka path. There was a long pause, and Poe realized that his boyfriend was taking longer than expected.

Actually, Ranpo had already guessed the answer about seconds ago, he was just...pausing because the answer was so simple it felt like a slap to his face.

L wasn’t hiding in hidden sight. He was hiding in plain sight. Specifically, the crowd.

Then it clicked and he grabbed Poe’s arm, pulling him out the door, “I knew that guy looked kind of sketchy! What’s this called? Foreshadowing?”

“Um?” Poe wasn’t quite on the same page as Ranpo at the moment.

“I don’t think you remember, but y’know those three kids that dragged Kyouka and Kenji away? They had an older brother or something,” Ranpo explained. “I think that’s L.”

“You think?”

“I’m only 98% sure,” Ranpo shrugged. “Oh god, he really was encouraging us to take the scavenger trail, it’s because he’s part of it too.”

“Oh, kinda...sneaky, I guess.”

“How can a man be so stupid and smart?”

Poe blinked, not sure what to say because he was staring at such a man at the moment. He didn’t know if he should point that out, wondering if it would kill Ranpo’s mood.

* * *

“Hey, I know you aren’t taking part in this challenge, but I think that kid’s older brother is and I kinda want to return this,” Reigen held up the little toy for Saitama to see and the man leaned forward and snorted.

“Looks like the kid.”

“Yeah, he probably put a lot of work into this. So I want to hand it back as soon as I can, or before I forget,” Reigen said, pocketing the thing. “You won’t miss him- Actually, maybe you will, I’m not sure. The guy has a skill at being able to blend in and stand out at will.”

“Like a ninja.”

If Genos could physically cringe, he would, “Please don’t talk about ninjas. That is the last thing I’d want to be reminded of during our trip away from home.”

“Okay, but you gotta help too. The little toy looks pretty cute and all. Would hate to see a kid cry about losing it, especially since he probably made it himself,” Saitama turned to the crowd of people and suppressed a groan, realizing it would be like finding a needle in a haystack. 

“Do you have a description of him?” Genos asked, already getting ready to plow through the crowd in search for the kid’s brother, just because Saitama genuinely looked worried. 

“Uh, he’s really pale, black messy hair, kinda looks like he just woke up but also didn’t get enough sleep. I swear he came to this event in his pajamas. White shirt, blu--” Reigen was cut short when he realized Genos had already gone off the moment he was done describing the guy’s facial appearance. He wasn’t sure if he was descriptive enough, but he didn’t bother to stop Genos anyway.

“I’ll try my best, I’ll call you if I find him,” Saitama made a phoning gesture before heading off as well, but not in much of a hurry. He’d probably set the carpet on fire if he was to actually run.

* * *

“What are you digging for? Your weird and sad excuse of a teddy bear opted to stay in the waiti-- the car, remember?” Matt almost let slip of the waiting room, the same exact room that was down the hallway behind them, the room they had passed moments ago. Mentioning it would raise a bit of suspicion between his new friends, like why they were in the waiting room prior to the event since they saw the three (four if you counted L) enter in with them through the front door.

“I know, I’m missing...I’m missing mini me,” Near said softly, almost embarrassed to admit he made a tiny replica of himself. “Can you...is it...um.”

“Oh sick, you still carry toys with you?” Shou snickered, doting on the boy.

“Well, I--”

“Are you like...a girl…?”

Ritsu really was seconds away from beating Shou on the back, but Mello had beaten him to it, except the blonde was more violent. The line awkwardly moved back as small gasps broke out when Mello slammed Shou against the wall.

“That’s it. I knew you were rude from the start!” Mello snarled, dangerously close to choking the life out of Shou.

“Says the one who’s currently using violence to solve his problems,” Shou sneered back, as if tempting Mello to fight him. The boy had psychic powers to defend himself, and he was pretty sure Mello had nothing but an empty brain.

“I will--”

“Break it up you two, Near’s getting upset,” Doutei sighed, two mechanical arms shot out of his backpack to pick both boys up by their torsos to separate them. Yet again, despite being the youngest, he had to be the one that was mature about the situation. Several kids who witnessed the mechanical arms come out almost screamed, and Mello was pretty much shocked into silence.

“I’m not, just…” Near kept leaning around to search the ground for a small object that remotely resembled his toy. “I don’t want to abandon the line to look for it, but--”

“It’s cool, I got this, don’t worry,” Matt hooked an arm around Near pretty sloppily, which only earned an annoyed look from the smaller boy. Matt pulled out his phone and tapped a few buttons before holding it up to his ear. “Near, don’t cry. Really, it’s...upsetting.”

“I am not crying.” Near huffed. Today really wasn’t his day. First, he was last for breakfast (which wasn’t a big deal in retrospect), second, he got his hand stepped on by accident (which actually turned out okay), and third, he lost his toy. 

“Sure you aren’t,” Matt smirked, then immediately changed his tone when the person on the other line picked up. “Ah, hello? I know this isn’t important but--”

* * *

“Near lost a little toy of his, it’s a rubber finger puppet, looks like him. Like a mini version of him,” Matt said on the other line when L had picked up.

There were a few odd looks shot his way when his phone started ringing, picking it up by the tip and answered it as if holding the top part of his phone was normal. 

Luckily enough, this actually got Reigen’s attention, who was just a few feet away from the man, and Reigen perked up in pleasant surprise that he had found the brother pretty quickly.

“Oh hey,” Reigen said, walking towards L.

“I found you,” Ranpo grinned, also going up to L about a few seconds after Reigen did. When the detective leaned to the side, his smile dropped to see Reigen, who was no doubt also grabbing L’s attention, and since he was the first to get here:

L turned to Reigen in confusion, then looked down when he saw the little finger puppet Near was missing in the other man’s hand. “Oh. Thank you.” He went back to talking on the phone. “Don’t worry, tell Near I found it. The man from earlier picked it up for you.” His words were so monotone, it made Reigen wonder if he really was thankful.

But then again, Shigeo was the same, so it was best not to think too much on that.

“How did you…?” Ranpo was, again, incredibly insulted. Reigen had luck on his side that made him find L first, which was...so...unfair. Seriously. Was the heavens trying to spit on his intelligence? He solved the challenge anyway, that was good enough, but he wasn’t the _first_. 

Then L left the two of them after taking the finger puppet from Reigen, walking off as if the conversation that was about to start wasn’t about him. 

“What about it?” Reigen asked, watching as L walked off to probably return the toy back to the child. 

“I…” Ranpo said, then dropped to a whisper so Reigen would be the only one that could hear him. “ _That was L.”_

“Oh. Did I solve…” Reigen mumbled. “Huh. Well. That’s that then.”

“You don’t care? Really?” Ranpo blinked in surprise.

“I think you just care too much,” Reigen said, still keeping his voice low. “I could tell from the beginning that you had some sort of inferiority complex towards that guy. I’m guessing you thought if you were the first one to find him in a short span of time, you’d somehow prove you were better. But I guess me beating you to it really broke you, huh?”

Ranpo frowned, about to leave when Reigen grabbed him to continue, “Nobody’s making it a contest, Edogawa. The whole title of being the best doesn’t matter as long as the both of you do a good job. It really boils down to how _you_ think about your own skill. If you think you’re better, then sure, just do a good job at solving cases and I’ll believe you. And, for your information, I wasn’t the first to find him”

Ranpo shook his head, after being lectured for about a minute, the last info kinda shook him a little. “What? Then…?”

“His brother dropped something, wanted to return it. I didn’t even know who he was until you told me. Technically, yes, I got to him first, but you’re the first to solve the challenge and identify him.” Reigen smiled, letting go of Ranpo at last. “Good job on that.”

“I...thanks.” Ranpo mumbled, quite baffled at how the man was treating him. Usually when he gave someone an attitude, their immediate response was to give an attitude of their own right back, but Reigen had been nice. He knew the man wasn’t stupid, he could tell Reigen knew that Ranpo was purposely being hostile, so it made that moment sort of weird. He felt bad. “Sorry about treating you like shit earlier.”

“When you deal with clients all day that have a range of attitudes, you get a higher tolerance for bullshit,” Reigen snorted, then he made a quick phone call to Saitama, letting him know that he had already handed the toy back.

“I told you it wasn’t a big deal,” Poe said, lacing his hand with Ranpo’s when he noticed the telltale sign of a quiet and upset Ranpo moment. “How do you feel?”

“Like a blob.” Ranpo replied, leaning closer to Poe for a hug, which the taller man immediately gave.

“The man said he gets clients everyday, do you think he’s like...an office worker at some agency--”

“He works at a consultation office, his own business. It’s an exorcism job mostly,” Ranpo easily answered with the use of Super Deduction. He had forgotten to take his glasses off from the excitement of finally finding L. “The kids he brought along are psychics based on what Kenji said.”

“Oh. Uh. That’s interesting.” Poe said, not quite expecting that answer.

“Hey, it makes for a good book idea.”

“I’ll keep that in mind, thanks.”

* * *

“Quit it, I’m not a baby,” Near bit, swatting Matt’s hands away again. They were almost at the front of the line and it’d probably take about three more minutes before they could take the elevator up to the escape rooms. Near didn’t want to leave before getting his toy back, so the more they moved up, the more upset he looked, though still subtle about it.

“But your eyes,” Matt brushed Near’s fringe aside and Near frowned. “They look so sad. Big and doll eyed.”

“They always look like that.”

“Cheer up, Near, your brother is coming over right now,” Kenji pointed his thumb over at the lanky looking man that was walking over with his hands stuffed into his pockets. “You too really look alike, huh?”

Honestly, the only similarity between them was how pale and doe-eyed they both looked, and their tendency to slink away from attention. Near didn’t enjoy candy as much as he did, nor did he have his jet-black disheveled hair, or those heavy eyebags.

“Thanks,” Near said in response, despite knowing it wasn’t exactly a compliment or an insult.

L didn’t say much when he reached the children, slowly pulling out the finger puppet from his pocket to give it back to Near, who cupped his hands to receive it. Near immediately brightened up when he got the mini replica of himself back, holding it up between his thumb and finger with a small smile.

“Be more careful next time,” L said, just for the sake of saying something because if he had left the interaction without a word, it would seem a bit too weird. “You guys have fun, alright?”

“We will,” Near said, still joyfully celebrating his toy’s return internally by himself. L nodded, not sure what else to say, and awkwardly shifted off. He still needed to go find that detective looking guy who somehow found him, they needed a small chat.

“Oh, hey, that’s sick,” Shou said, reaching out to touch the finger puppet, and Near immediately reared back in defense. Shou blinked, pulling his hand back. “Sorry. Uh, about earlier too, I guess.”

“About time you apologized,” Mello grunted, arms folded tightly.

Shou snorted, laughing lightly before tugging Ritsu to his side, whispering into his boyfriend’s ear. Then Ritsu made the attempt not to laugh along as well, but failed after a few seconds had passed. Mello stared at the interaction, face suddenly going red from embarrassment, mostly because he wasn’t sure what he did that made them both laugh.

“Sorry, sorry, it’s just, you reminded Shou and I of Prince Charming over there,” Ritsu nodded his head at Teru, who was talking to Kenji and Doutei about what to expect in the escape room.

Matt blew air through his nose in a short laugh, “Sure, they’re both blonde. What else? Mello isn’t exactly a boy of charm.”

“Yeah, but Teru gets pretty ugly if you disturb Nii-san,” Ritsu added, as if he wouldn’t do the same. “Shou just finds that pretty funny since Teru and Nii-san are dating, so it makes it look like you two are dating too.”

Mello made a strangled choking sound, his face going from an initial pink to a bright red, “We’ve barely known each other for months!” Near didn’t say anything, opting to lean against the wall so he could squish and pinch his finger puppets for fun.

Ritsu shot him a skeptical smirk, making Mello grow even redder, his blush spreading down to his neck. Shou, on the other hand, wasn’t smiling as wide anymore, dropping into a low chuckle as he spoke, “Aren’t you three long time friends?”

Mello almost widened his eyes in response, and bit his tongue to stop himself from doing so. Matt barely looked alarmed, but he shot Mello a sideways glance before returning back to his console, which left Mello with Near to back him up.

“We consider that a long time,” Near quickly answered without a single stutter, eyes still glued to his toys. “Mello probably thinks it’s short.” Even though that had saved Mello, the blonde couldn’t help but feel that it somehow made him look worse.

Shou didn’t look convinced for a moment, but when no one said anything after that, he bought it, “M’kay. Hey look! We’re next!” The group in front of them had already left through the elevator and they were finally at the front of the line.

“Ah, you.” The lady said, a name tag hung around her neck to indicate she worked here. “You sure did cause a lot of ruckus in the line.”

“Ha ha ha, sorry,” Teru stepped in, showing his pearly white teeth in a smile. It was moments like these that made his charm come in handy. The lady smiled back softly, folding her arms and tapping her elbow with her finger.

“It’s fine. The ten of you then?” She asked, checking her phone for a moment before slipping it back into her pocket.

“Yep.”

“Perfect, just wait a few more minutes and you can head up,” she said, and Teru turned to the rest, shooting a thumbs up. Then she continued, with a cheerful sort of smile, “Just try not to cause chaos in the escape room, alright? You’re a real rowdy bunch.”

“Oh gee, how can you tell?” Doutei answered sarcastically and the woman’s eyes swept over the ten kids, starting with Kyouka.

“She looks like she’s seen enough violence in her life,” she hummed, tapping her elbow once again in thought. “The only girl in this group here?”

Kyouka slowly nodded, realizing that only now. She was always used to being surrounded by men back in the mafia with Kouyou being the only female around her constantly, so this didn’t feel like out of the norm.

“Then there’s you two,” the lady glanced over at Shou and Mello. “Try not to fight too much.”

“No promises!” Shou let out a breathy laugh.

“And, no food or drinks inside by the way.”

Doutei replied to that instantly, waving his hand in reassurance, “Don’t worry, I’m almost done with it.” His large lollipop had been licked down to the size of a golf ball, so she wasn’t sure if she’d call that done.

“How confident are all of you for this, hm?” The lady continued to talk to waste some time while also trying to hype the ten kids up. 

Shigeo vaguely shrugged, only here because he thought it’d be fun, Doutei smirked, looking a bit too confident, and Kenji beamed widely, looking just as excited as Shou was. Teru didn’t have much of an answer, and Ritsu did a similar response as Shigeo’s.

The only people who didn’t react much were Near, Matt, and Mello, who were only really here to mingle than to actually play the game. Maybe collect a few data along the way, but they specifically told the kids to just have fun, so they weren’t going to give it their all for that part. 

“Ah, looks like a group just left, you can go up now,” the lady smiled after checking her phone again. She pressed the up button and held it so the ten could take their time getting in. She leaned inside and pressed the floor number, holding the door so she could leave them with one more message. “Okay, so, I know the whole ad said it was meant for kids below seventeen, but whoever thought of these escape room ideas clearly didn’t know how to handle their horror. But you guys look like you can handle scary stuff pretty well, yeah? So we’re gonna give you the sort of scariest one.”

“What do you mean by tha--” Shigeo spoke up in confusion, not quite grasping what she was saying.

“They’ll explain it more when you’re upstairs, have fun!” She smiled, stepping out of the elevator so the doors could close.

* * *

The last thing Reigen would’ve expected out of today was to leave his best friend hanging after telling him they’d meet near the entrance of the banquet hall, only to be dragged away by Ranpo to some secluded area where that kid’s older brother was standing with Poe awkwardly. 

Reigen honestly felt bad, Genos and Saitama had only came because Saitama’s brothers did and Doutei needed someone to escort him to the event, but now that the kids were busy with the escape room challenge, Reigen was their only friend willing to stick around to keep them company.

Then again, on the bright side, hopefully they’d take this as a chance to be alone for once and probably wind down. 

L rubbed the back of his shin with his foot, possibly itching for something sweet right about now, but looked up when he saw the two making their way over. There was an awkward silence between the four men and Reigen raised an eyebrow, glancing between L and Ranpo, “Well?”

“L didn’t actually expect anyone to find him. The clues in the trail don’t actually lead to him, it leads to a person that’s pretending to be him, so he won’t risk his own safety. But since I, the greatest detective, managed to figure it out, he now has to tell us to keep it a secret for him,” Ranpo explained when L didn’t, feeling quite proud of himself for figuring about L’s whole plan within seconds. He was surprised to see L reapproaching him, and for a moment, he had thought that L wanted him to keep quiet so the others could figure the challenge out themselves, which was partially the case.

“Oh, is that it? I wasn’t really planning on telling actually, I had the feeling the real L wouldn’t do something that...dangerous,” Reigen said. It was one of the main reasons why Reigen didn’t participate, he didn’t believe he was smart enough to solve it, and he also had the feeling the challenge was slightly rigged, which would’ve been a problem if there was prize money involved. But since this whole challenge was for fun, he didn’t say anything. 

“Now that’s out of the way, join me for cake and juice, we have much to discuss about being great detectives!” Ranpo said, nearly placing his hands on L’s shoulders to push him towards the nearest cafe they could possibly find within this building, but the other had side stepped before Ranpo could, so the shorter man was nearly sent tumbling forward. “Oi, what gives?”

“Don’t touch me. But,” L said, almost looking embarrassed to say this, “I would love to have cake with you, I suppose. I really do want to know how you managed to find me so fast without following the trail properly.”

“Fantastic! While we’re at it, do you want to try solving some mystery novels written by my dear boyfriend here?” Ranpo continued to chat, letting L lead the way since the man looked a bit more familiar with the building than he did.

Poe flushed at the title Ranpo introduced him with, and fumbled around, reaching inside his coat. He looked for his emergency Ranpo-needs-entertainment-novel, so he could hold onto it and read it once they reached their destination.

Reigen sighed, shaking his head. At least the weird tense aura around Ranpo had disappeared, he’d recognized it around Ritsu before, so he was pretty familiar with it when Ranpo first interacted with him. He went back to where he was supposed to meet his two hero friends and found them just chatting about, with Saitama using Genos as a leaning post while they talked.

Reigen almost felt bad about interrupting their peace time together and almost decided to just steer away from them and walk a few rounds before coming back again, but Saitama had noticed him from afar and waved him over with a grin.

“Late as per usual, Taka,” Saitama teased, arms crossed and somewhat hiding his bold hoodie. 

“Yeah, Ranpo had to talk to me about something,” Reigen answered truthfully, which was quite unlike of him, but there was no use lying if Saitama had a lie detector for a boyfriend standing right next to him.

“Your luck is quite outstanding, Reigen. It barely took you ten minutes to locate the boy’s older brother,” Genos complimented, his facial expressions barely changing, so it reminded Reigen of his old school teachers whenever he did anything remotely intelligent. Reigen didn’t know how to feel about that.

“Thanks, I get that a lot,” Reigen snorted, deciding to turn it as a joke to make himself feel better.

* * *

The elevator door opened to two small hallways on either side, the wall in front of them was lined with a few doors that were fairly spaced out, and there was a man that had a similar lanyard as the lady downstairs waiting for them with a warm smile. 

As the crew stepped out of the lift, the man took a step back so they didn’t have to squeeze together as much from the narrow space, and clapped his hands together cheerfully, bending slightly and resting his hands on his knees as he spoke, “I take it that you lot are the ones that will be taking the scarier room?” He made air quotes around the word ‘scary’, as if he was talking to a bunch of little kids.

Granted, they weren’t that old either, but Doutei didn’t look that innocent compared to Near despite being the youngest, so there was no reason for the man to treat them with that much exaggeration. Regardless, they answered with a few nods anyway and he smiled a little wider, straightening up, “Alright, let’s go then!”

“Ah, um, the lady downstairs said that...um...you’d explain why...uh...the...um,” Shigeo stuttered, his voice growing quieter and quieter as he spoke, and realizing this, his face grew a bit hot. Luckily, the man understood what the boy had meant, and explained as he kept walking.

“So basically, a bunch of Kira supporters came together and wanted to create some escape rooms in Kira’s name, but they never fully carried it out since he got arrested and all, but the rooms were already a work in progress and it’d be a shame if they just tore it all down,” the man said, his right hand gesturing about, which reminded Shigeo of Reigen. “So the people who organized this event recycled the project since some of them were ex-Kira supporters, which is a bit, y’know, ugh, if you ask me, but I just work here. Anyways, the first room was the only one that ever got properly completed, but it’s a bit...extreme? Realistically scary, and since the escape rooms are for kids, we thought we’d go the day without having to use it.”

“But then we came along, huh?” Shou bounced with excitement at the thought of simulated danger. It had been a while since something exciting had happened to him, so this would probably satisfy his risk-filled needs. 

“Anyone friends with a kid hero should be able to handle it,” the man shrugged, a bright smile still plastered onto his face. Doutei blinked, realizing he was talking about him, and rubbed the back of his head with a nervous laughter.

“Not to be boastful, but I’m honestly surprised not many people recognized me here,” Doutei said, his golf ball sized lollipop had shrunk to the size of a quarter after many determined licks, but if it came to it, he’d store it into his bag for later before entering the room.

“Well, you _are_ at a L-slash-ex-Kira event, it was to be expected. I heard you guys caused a lot of commotion downstairs, one of the many reasons why you’re getting this room.”

“You make it sound like this is a punishment.”

The man snorted, stopping at the last door in the hallway, “More like, you guys had proven you are worthy to experience this room. But just in case, if you really can’t handle it, it’s okay to bail now since there’s no going back.”

Something about his bright smile had changed, even though it was still the same smile he had been smiling the whole time, but it seemed a little eerie, like he was warning them to carefully think about their choice. It dawned upon Ritsu that not once did they have a say in this and he guessed that everyone assumed they didn’t have a choice.

He almost spoke up, but was suddenly stopped when his time ran out to say something, and the man’s grin seemed to have gone sharper when he gripped the door handle, pushing it open, “Fantastic! Go right in and wait for the game to begin. Have fun!”

With that, they were gently escorted, or probably shoved, inside. 

“Well, he seems friendly, doesn’t he?” Kenji beamed, scanning the room.

It looked like a standard waiting room, two couches and a rectangle coffee table littered with magazines in the middle and four metal pillars in each corner. There was a large window at the end of the room and a generic office water dispenser to its left, a couple of large and small paintings on the wall to the right and a small bookshelf to the left.

Overall, it looked quite empty for an escape room, unless they expect the kids to scavenge the bookshelf and analyze the paintings. The only really weird thing they noticed was the ceiling light, which was shaped like a ceiling fan, with each of its ten blades serving as lights.

“Is the window real?” Teru squinted, being the first to take a few steps more inside. He touched the glass panes, feeling its unnatural warmth. “This really is just a room then.”

“If it weren’t for the window, even I would’ve been fooled into thinking this is an actual waiting room,” Matt laughed, scaling the entire area, before getting bored exactly five seconds later and plopped onto the couch with a bounce. 

“Technically, based on what the guy just said, this is the game room and the game might’ve already started,” Near mumbled, climbing onto the couch Matt was on and sat on the opposite end of the boy. He picked up the magazines and thumbed through them mindlessly, thinking through his plans.

“You’re not going to make the effort to help?” Doutei asked, too short to properly lean over Matt’s face, who was resting his head on the backrest of the couch.

“Nah, there’s ten of us right? I only came because Near wanted to, I don’t actually plan on doing anything,” Matt responded, draping his arm over his eyes so he wouldn’t have to look at Doutei. Near hummed to confirm that Matt was right, though knowing fully well that Matt only said that because he was already putting _his_ plan into action; doing absolutely nothing to frustrate the others.

Near’s plan was to do some minor sabotaging, but he had to fully understand the room first before doing so, or he might break something, permanently damaging their chances in escaping. Sure, it was a game and all, but if you can’t win the game, it’d just make you a loser, and Near was anything but a loser.

Mello, on the other hand, was planning to be a bit more active, though not now of course. He already knew who to target, and he was sure he might wind up with a broken nose or something, but hell did he have the urge to just bark and bite at someone for entertainment.

Shou, predictably, opted to stare at the paintings, and for once he actually looked like he was deep in thought, except he really wasn’t. For an artist, he was never a person that liked to observe paintings that had deep meaning behind them, he found it a bit too boring. Though, regardless, he tried his best anyway.

Emphasis on ‘his best’.

“They really wouldn’t appreciate us tearing this whole place apart, right?” Kenji asked, rolling his shoulders back as if that was what he was going to do if nobody said yes. 

“Using brute force never works in these rooms,” Ritsu quickly replied before the blonde could begin ripping the ground up for “clues”. “Just look around for things that might come in useful.”

“Oh, alright!”

Ritsu blew out a breath of relief, he’d have to keep check with all the rowdy kids in the room before they can cause a scene and get them all kicked out. What a fantastic way to spend his time in this puzzle room.

Doutei had pretty much already scanned a quarter of the bookshelf for clues and Kyouka carefully glanced at some of them before finally pulling out a certain book and peaked her interest. Surprisingly enough, the book she pulled out weighed heavier than it seemed to be and she opened it, revealing there was a star-head screwdriver inside.

“Oh, I found something,” she said softly, this all felt weirdly familiar yet new. It had a mission vibe to it, which she didn’t like all that much, but it had her feeling pretty excited as well because she knew this was all just a game and she was here with friends, which made this all the more fun to experience.

“A screwdriver. We haven’t found anything to unscrew yet, right?” Doutei walked over after sliding back the book he was holding back into the bookshelf.

A couple of shaking heads and a few murmurs of ‘no’s answered him. Ritsu smiled, recognizing the book’s title. ‘Fahrenheit 451’, he had read it at some point when he was bored months ago. He tried reading it in english as well at some point, but gave up a quarter in, and tried to get Shou to read it for him, who wasn’t exactly a fan of books. But since it had fires in it, it got Shou hooked.

It was a nice memory.

“Should I take the paintings down and see what’s behind?” Shou asked, turning his head so glance over at Doutei for an opinion, which felt foreign to him. Shou was more used to doing things on his own accord, but he couldn’t help but appoint Doutei as temporary leader since he wasn’t feeling up to it today. Puzzle games were fun and all, but he didn’t like being contained for too long.

“Go ahead,” Doutei waved his hand to grant the ginger permission, and like that, the paintings came flying off with an orange aura around them.

Shocking the three geniuses near the couch. 

“Did you…?” Mello blinked, staring at the paintings on the ground. 

“Is that…?” Near squinted, rerunning his options in his head. This definitely changed his plan, just a little.

“Wicked,” Matt grinned, calming down from his surprise. Hey, if death gods exist, why not psychics?

“Why thank you, Matt,” Shou bowed with exaggeration, a smug grin was immediately shot towards Mello’s way. “I am a psychic. Yes.”

Mello gulped, trying not to let the surprise on his face make him look weak, though it was pretty impossible. He couldn’t possibly start a fight with Shou now, or he might actually die.

“Don’t worry, I wouldn’t dare lay a single finger on you, Ritsu’s brother won’t ever let me,” Shou tilted his head at Shigeo, who was by Teru’s side and observing the water dispenser. Despite the reassurance, Mello could still hear a hint of aggression in Shou’s tone, as if he was also challenging Mello, daring him to try and fight the psychic. 

“You missed a painting,” Ritsu deadpanned and Shou whipped his head around, staring at a particularly small painting on the center of the wall. 

“Strange,” Shou said, gripping his hands on the sides and tugging. “Won’t budge, and I’m sure I can’t use brute force.”

“No you can’t, so that must be some secret door then?” Ritsu walked over, tracing his fingers over it, trying to locate a screw to see if the screwdriver Kyouka found would come in useful now. Sadly, he found none. “No screws. Definitely a door though.” To confirm this, he knocked his knuckles against it, and the sound he heard was a hollow metallic echo.

“What if…” Shigeo walked back over to the door where they had came in through from and Ritsu shook his head, knowing exactly what Shigeo was thinking.

“There’s no way it would be that easy.” Ritsu said, pretty sure that the door handle didn’t even have any clues on it anyway.

Shigeo disregarded his brother, much to the other’s displeasure, and examined the handle, touching it, before gripping it and accidentally popping it off the door. “Oh.”

“Not even ten minutes in and bowl-cut here already broke the door!” Mello accidentally blurted and Ritsu flashed him a dangerous glare, sending shivers down the blonde’s spine, which Mello thought wasn’t really possible.

“Don’t worry, Nii-san, if it came off that easily, it should pop back in as easy too!” Ritsu quickly walked over to reassure Shigeo.

Shigeo stared at the base of where the door handle had popped off from, and leaned forward, “It looks like...an oven dial.”

“What?” Ritsu bent down and leaned over where the door handle was as well. It really did look like an oven thermostat, which was a strange choice if they were supposed to dial a code in with that. “Ah wait, actually…” Remembering the book Kyouka found, he turned the dial to 451. It was worth a shot, and he doubted anything would happen if he was wrong.

And unfortunately, he spoke too soon.

“What...did you do?” Matt glanced up at the ceiling, which was turning bright red, almost like the inside of an oven. The abnormal ceiling light had shut off, so the room was slightly colored red from the crimson lights that had blinked on.

Weirdly warm crimson lights, actually.

“Feeling a bit like summer now, don’t it?” Kenji commented, smiling up at the ceiling. 

“Ooooo, is this what they meant by simulated danger? The whole “too scary” thing?” Shou jumped, staring at the ceiling as well. “Lovely!”

“Easy for you to say, you’re used to hot stuff,” Teru snorted, rolling up his sweater sleeves to compensate for the sudden rise in temperature. 

“Yeah duh, Ritsu’s my boyfriend.”

Ritsu flushed, storming across the room and towards the coffee table, where Near was still sitting on the couch and browsing through the magazines, “Not the time to be flirting now.”

“They’re not...actually going to...kill us in here, right?” Shigeo whispered, feeling his stress levels rise up. He had long solved his explosion issue, but he was still somewhat prone to feeling stressed in suffocating situations, and usually it would still cause some accidental power blips.

“Mob, you’re shaking the water dispenser,” Doutei pointed out and Shigeo sucked in a breath of air and started counting, nodding as he did. The younger boy sighed, scratching his head, “They definitely won’t kill us in here.”

“You should grab a cup of water, Kageyama,” Near suggested, eyes not lifting from the coffee table. 

“Ah, yeah, I should, thanks,” Shigeo mumbled, now noticing how sweaty he was, it was probably a mix between fear and the heat of the room that caused him to become partially drenched. 

Teru quickly poured his boyfriend a tall plastic cup of water from the water dispenser and gently placed a hand on Shigeo’s shoulder as the raven began to gulp it down. Right as he was doing so, Teru noticed how the pillars looked rather red now too, which he thought was just a reflection of the ceiling.

“The room is getting hotter,” Teru spoke, not sure if the room was trying to be immersive or just plain old murderous. 

“Should I ram the door down?” Kenji volunteered, rolling his shoulders once again.

“No, no, I...it’s probably just…” Teru licked his lips, ignoring the fact that he was growing a bit thirsty. Just a bit. Learning pyrokinesis had made him more resistant to heat, and he didn’t want to look pathetic in front of Shigeo.

“Alright then,” Kenji hummed, dropping his arms again. He sighed, wiping the sweat off his forehead and dropping his hands down onto the table. Then his hand _sunk_ into the table, a circle forming underneath his palm where his hand had pressed down on. “What’s this?”

There was a sound that came from the wall, where the painting was, and everyone turned to see the painting had shifted upwards to reveal a vent behind it. It hadn’t shifted all the way and Ritsu’s eyes widened, immediately shoving all the magazines off the table, making Near quite displeased, and he found seven coasters. There was probably one more underneath Kenji’s hand, so with that being said…

Ritsu pressed his hand down on one of the coasters, and it sunk down like a button, making the painting rise up even more.

Then he was pretty sure the room grew even redder. In fact, all Ritsu could really see now was red, and he was pretty sure the table was steaming. 

“Guys, get over here and press the coasters with me,” Ritsu barked, feeling panicked. He was sure this was just a game, but now he couldn’t tell at all. 

Near slid off the couch and pressed down on a coaster, along with Mello, Kyouka, Teru, and Shigeo. Despite being in a kimono, Kyouka looked like she was holding up well, but Ritsu could see the slight glistening on the side of her head.

Now that the painting had fully risen, Doutei offered to be the one that explored the vent, since he was the smallest and it’d be the easiest for him. Shou and, surprisingly enough, Matt pushed a couch against the wall so the little boy could climb in easier, and waited for Doutei to tell them what he found.

“Kenji, mind you stop smiling for a bit, getting a bit too bright in here with all the red,” Shou joked to ease the tension forming within the room, because now it was pretty evident that the heat wasn’t going to stop rising until it was unbearable.

“Very funny, Suzuki,” Mello rolled his eyes, adjusting his hands on the coaster. Shou frowned, walking towards the table.

“Man don’t you ever get that stick out of your a--”

“I found another vent! I think I’ll be needing that screwdriver!” Doutei yelled from within the air duct and Kyouka looked up, waving the screwdriver that was still in her hand. She nearly asked for Demon Snow to hand it to Doutei for her, but remembered she wasn’t allowed to use her abilities in the escape room like Poe had told them to. 

“Hey, Kyouka, you can give it to him yourself, I’ll hold the button down for you,” Shou said, walking over to replace her spot. “Besides, you’re the second smallest here.”

“Okay,” Kyouka said, taking her hand off the coaster so Shou could press it down, and walked towards the air duct, climbing in to hand the screwdriver over.

“I just, ha ha, realized,” Teru wiped his forehead with one of his hands, “we could’ve easily just used telekinesis to give it to him.”

“It’s fine, we’re all going to leave through that vent anyway,” Near said, sounding so sure of himself it made Shou skeptical.

“Well, aren’t you a genius?” Shou mused, lips curling into a smirk.

“Oh back off, you can’t possibly think Near made this room.” Mello grumbled, knowing exactly what Shou was getting on.

“Hey I didn’t say it, you did,” Shou shrugged. The heat was really getting to him now, which shocked him, since he never really sweated that much when being surrounded by fire. “But since you brought that up, don’t you find it weird how he wanted to play escape room yet he did almost nothing the whole time? I can understand why Matt didn’t do anything, since he did tell us from the start. But Near?”

“I don’t do things until I’m a hundred percent sure it’ll work out. Unlike your boyfriend, who started this oven in the first place,” Near snapped, not exactly mad at the accusation, but more for the sake of riling Shou up, and boy did it work. 

“At least he did something!”

“Something stupid. Who doesn’t make the connection that turning the dial would start a fire? Even the book was called ‘Fahrenheit’.” Near said, fingers curling and looking away.

“Don’t say that about my brother,” Shigeo frowned, also getting pretty upset.

“Fellas, let’s not--” Kenji started, but before he could finish, large panels on the walls of the room opened up, and suddenly there were fans blowing hot air throughout the area. “Uh oh.”

“Okay there is no way this room _isn’t_ trying to kill us now,” Teru said, considerably concerned about the fact that this was all getting too realistic and, most importantly, too hot.

“One of you!” Doutei yelled again. “Come on! We opened the vent!”

“Shigeo, you go,” Teru immediately said, already putting his other hand down on Shigeo’s button. “Then Near--”

“Seriously?” Shou lifted a brow as Shigeo began to hesitantly remove his hand from the coaster button to climb through the air duct. Near blinked up at Mello, shifting off the button so the blonde could take over for him, and he began climbing onto the couch and into the air duct as well.

“Look, I’m going by durability here, clearly us two can handle the heat, Near and Shigeo are the most physically vulnerable,” Teru reasoned, trying his best not to squish his face against the steaming table. “Matt, can you _please_ do something?”

“Oh sure, you want a glass of water?” Matt grinned smugly despite the situation.

“That’s it! Matt, get us a glass of water.” Ritsu’s eyes brightened with an idea and the gamer paused, taken aback by the response. “Fill it as much as you can.”

“Uh, yeah, sure,” he said, jogging over to the water dispenser and pouring himself a cup, then gingerly brought it back to Ritsu, holding his hand over the top so it won’t spill.

Slowly, Ritsu took his hands off the coaster and placed the cup down onto it. It sunk down like Ritsu had expected and grinned, wiping his forehead. 

“Have I told you how much I love you yet?” Shou asked and Ritsu rolled his eyes. “You can go now, we can take it from here, right Teru?”

“Yeah, go on Little Bro,” Teru nodded. Him and Shou were better at using telekinesis anyway, and even though it would be cheating, their lives were on the line and they couldn’t afford to stick with their morals right now. “You too, Kenji, Ritsu’s a bit claustrophobic, so he’d be needing a friend.”

“Can do.” Kenji beamed, following after Ritsu once Shou’s hand was pressed on the coaster the blonde was holding down.

“Don’t just…” Ritsu huffed in exasperation, but gave up halfway and just walked off.

Shou and Teru immediately got to work, filling six more cups and placing them down on the coasters. Seeing as how things seemed to be okay now, Matt bid them goodbye and left through the air ducts, not caring much if they were going to stop him or not.

“We need one more,” Teru said, expecting Shou to bring in one more cup.

“I…” Shou blanched, suddenly running over to the water dispenser when he sensed something wasn’t right. “It’s empty, we’re out of water.”

Mello nearly laughed, because Near was probably aware that the water played a part in the puzzle and purposely told Shigeo to take a drink so they’d run out, and it seemed Shou was aware of that too.

“You sneaky--” Shou stormed over to Mello, who hadn’t changed his facial expression yet, but Teru stopped him. 

“Near was just looking out for Shige, you can’t think that--”

“Oh but I do, because that’s something I’d do as well if I were him,” Shou sneered.

“You can hardly compare to Near,” Mello scoffed, hand still pressed on the coaster.

“Guys, not now, before we get boiled alive, can we please think of something to replace the half filled cup?” Teru sighed in frustration, and right at that moment, the funny looking ceiling light lowered down a little, and it looked like it was heating up. “Shit, Mello, you gotta go.”

“What about--” 

“We’ll be fine, we’re psychics,” Teru said, pulling Mello to his feet and shoving him over to the vent. He pressed the coaster down for the painting to rise up fully again to let Mello enter, and once he was gone, Teru placed the cup down on the coaster. “We need to think to think of a plan, because I don’t want to hang back and find out if that’s real.”

“I’ve got an idea,” Shou skidded towards the bookshelves, pulling out as many hardcover books he could find. “Get to the vent, I’ll be there in a moment.”

“Okay,” Teru replied, understanding Shou’s plan. He ran over to the painting and climbed onto the couch, putting his arms through the gap so he’d be ready to push himself inside.

Shou carefully stacked the books on top of the half filled cup, and as expected, it sunk, and the painting went up again. “Go! Go! Go!”

Teru slid himself into the vent and crawled, ignoring how hot the sides of the air duct felt and found the vent that Doutei had unscrewed earlier on top of him, and he shifted himself and pulled himself up, feeling a pair of hands grab him to hoist him up.

Shou came sliding after, small enough for the constricting space to not be an issue, and with his powers, he flew upwards without the need of the others to bring him up, and collapsed on the carpeted floor, immediately taking in the cool air.

“Oh my god,” Shou wheezed, his cheeks hurting from how much he was smiling. “That was...awesome.”

“Awesome? Awesome?!” Ritsu yelled, shaking his boyfriend with his sweaty palms. “You could’ve died!”

“On the contrary, that room did actually turn out to be a fake,” Shou took off his jacket, and grossly enough, used it as a towel to wipe the sweat off his forehead and neck. “It’s built like a sauna, the air was moist if you didn’t notice. Hot, yes, but seriously humid. It’s why I was sweating so much, I would’ve handled regular heat just fine.”

“You’re stupid, it still felt so real, and you weren’t even scared.” Ritsu breathed, wrapping his arms around Shou’s neck in relief.

“Babe, babe, too warm!” Shou yelped, peeled Ritsu’s arms off him, flapping his own arms out to cool himself down some more. “But yeah, that’s just how cool I am. Also, where are we?”

“We’re not in an escape room anymore, there’s only one room, there should be a staircase nearby,” Near hummed, playing with his finger puppets again, and Shou frowned.

“You’re seriously suspicious.”

“No, no, he’s definitely right, Kyouka and I found the stairs over there,” Doutei jabbed his thumb down the hallway, where a door with the label ‘stairs’ next to it was. “You’re really dead set on bothering Near, huh?”

“My gut tells me he’s suspicious,” Shou whispered, loud enough for practically everyone to hear, which made it sound like he was mostly joking. 

“It’s really not nice to bully someone younger than you, Suzuki,” Kenji piped up and Shou had the feeling Kenji’s emotions could only vary through smiles, Seriously, does his cheeks never hurt from all that beaming?

“Okay, I’ll drop it,” Shou raised his hands up in defeat. “Could really go for some ice cream right about now.”

Kyouka’s face lit up at the mention of the cold snack and nodded in agreement, “Strawberry.”

“Chocolate,” Mello mumbled under his breath.

“I’m seeing a recurring pattern here,” Teru noted. It seemed like a lot of people here really liked eating and using it as a bonding moment.

“Vanilla,” Near and Shigeo said at the same time, and Shigeo’s eyes sparkled while Near’s face went a bit pink.

“Do you like...milk?” Shigeo asked softly, watching the smaller boy blinked up at him.

“Yes.”

Looked like Near had met all of Shigeo’s standards as a good friend.

“Hopefully that staircase leads to a cafe or something then,” Doutei said, a mechanical arm poked out of his bag and handed him back his near-finishing lollipop before going back in. The boy let it rest in his mouth, beginning to take the first few steps towards the staircase.

“I will lose my absolute shit if it turns out to be another escape room,” Ritsu mumbled under his breath, causing Matt to snort a little too loudly.

Right as Doutei opened the door, there was a confetti pop and streamers flew everywhere, covering the boy, and he stared in confusion at the two employees that seemingly worked there.

“Congratulations! You made it out alive! I heard you lot got the hardest one and you got out just in time,” one said, gently plucking the paper bits out of Doutei's hair. “As promised, here are your prizes!”

They were all handed cheques, and it seemed a bit funny to receive the prize at the entrance of a stairwell rather than somewhere more appropriate.

“This is just...a million yen,” Teru said, then went pink and quickly waved his hands. “I’m not implying that I want more I’m just--”

“Oh I understand,” the other said, laughing nervously. “A lot of people were mistaken as well, but actually, ten million yen is rewarded per group and divided between members. It’s in case there are groups that prefer to go in smaller fractions, and it would make the puzzle solving harder since there’s less people. But since you took the hardest, I don’t mind handing more. It’s actually pretty difficult to solve th--”

“It’s fine,” Shou quickly said before Teru could say anything. “It’s the fun that counts. I’m just more curious how this event got funded this much money.”

“Ex-Kira donations,” the employee said with a shrug. “A good portion were anonymous, this event is sort of a way to give back, I suppose. The cafe even lowered their prices and such.”

“I see…” Shou mumbled, then grinned brightly and stuffed the cheque haphazardly into his pocket. “Well we’ll be off then! We want ice cream!”

* * *

“It’s the gardener, the cuts are from gardening shears, and she seems a bit too close to the wife,” L said, only a page into the chapter and he already solved it. There were more mysteries within the book of course, and there were about fifteen more, plus L had long figured out that each story was somehow interconnected in a way. 

Poe could tell L was interested in his writing, every so often catching the man smiling at a certain page, and Ranpo looked just as happy as Poe was. Because, really, nothing made Ranpo happier than someone else appreciating Poe’s work. 

“That’s a nice touch, by the way, usually no one would guess the gardener and the wife had a relationship happening,” L mumbled, turning the page. 

“We don’t get a lot of representation in books sometimes,” Poe responded and L nodded.

“Ranpo! Poe!” Kenji waved, appearing from the emergency staircase behind them, which was...pretty odd since the elevator they had taken was on the other side of the building. 

“How did you get…?” Poe pointed.

“Long story, we’ll tell you later!”

“Why are you all so sweaty, there’s no way stairs could make you--”

“We want ice cream!”

Poe blinked rapidly, which went unnoticed due to his long bangs, but you could see his whole body had gone rigid from shock. “A-All ten of you?”

“Seven, my brother can pay for us,” Near corrected from behind, which made Poe feel a bit better, though it still didn’t change the fact that there were seven kids he had to pay for. Granted, they could’ve just used their prize money, but it was too much to just spend on ice cream, and they didn’t feel like giving the cashier a headache.

Where was Reigen anyway? Or Kageyama Saitama and his boyfriend??

“Aw, c’mon, Poe, they deserve a treat,” Ranpo smiled, resting his elbows on the table and his chin on his propped up hand. “They went through a fiery experience, y’know?”

“How did--?” Shou squinted, a bit baffled by Ranpo’s correct assumption.

“Okay,” Poe sighed, standing up so he could pay for their ice cream at the counter. “Pick your flavors.”

“...and then I used books to weigh it down!” Shou finished, hands swaying about as did, and Doutei had to duck his head twice to avoid being hit.

“Ah...that’s...pretty smart of you,” Poe nodded, not sure why he got assigned to listening to the kids talk. Not that he didn’t mind since, of course, but he felt that L or Ranpo could’ve engaged the children better than him. “Your ice cream is melting.”

“Oops!” Shou licked the side of his cone before it could drip onto his hand.

“That’s why I told you to get a cup!” Ritsu scolded, pointing his spoon at Shou.

“Switch with me then.”

It took a moment, but Ritsu knew there was no use arguing with Shou about such a trivial thing, so after taking one last scoop, he switched with Shou.

Near visibly cringed, eating his ice cream in silence.

They managed to reach Reigen and the others, who had pretty much been waiting for the kids to get back, and Shigeo was pretty sure Reigen and Saitama were using Genos as a charging station for their phones at the moment.

When the man saw them coming over, he turned his phone off and smiled, “Did you guys have fun?”

“Here he goes again,” Teru chuckled, taking a bite out of his ice cream. Matt winced at the blonde’s boldness. It was hard to find a flaw in Teru, everything he did seemed easy, even eating ice cream.

Mello, on the other hand, was just aggressively perfect. He had gotten an ice cream sandwich, and Matt wondered how he hadn't gotten a toothache yet from all that chocolate consumption. 

“Okay so basically…” Shou started and Reigen swore the inside of his ice cream cup just _sloshed_ around.

* * *

The event closed with absolutely no one finding (phony) L, but they were highly encouraged to come again tomorrow to try again if they wanted to. Even though this was a three-day event, L doubted that a crowd like this would happen again tomorrow since there wasn’t much to do. It was like a party, and at some point, someone had suggested they have a memorial for all the victims of the massacre.

Then they remembered a good chunk of the people who died were criminals, and the most they could do was make one for all those dead businessmen.

Maybe L could try changing up some of the clues, Poe and Ranpo really had him inspired with the books and stories they shared.

“Where’s your hotel? Maybe we share the same one.” Shigeo asked, making his way towards the exit with the rest while Near, Mello, and Matt hung back.

“We live around here.” Near answered.

“In the...middle of the city? Did you take a bus--”

“We drove. We drove here.” 

Shigeo stared for a moment, but was satisfied with the answer when Near didn’t say anything more. They did seem like Tokyo kids, to be honest. He smiled, waving as he left through the doors, “Okay then, see you tomorrow?”

“Mhm, have a good night, Mob,” Near waved.

“Shigeo, are you sure you want your new friends calling you ‘Mob’?” Saitama asked, hands in his pocket as the group left the event and made their way back to the hotel.

“It’s easier, there’s three of us,” Shigeo shrugged. “I don’t mind.”

“It doesn’t change the fact that it can be used as an insult,” Genos added with concern.

“It’s not an insulting nickname if I like it,” Shigeo shrugged again, making it seem like he had this conversation countless times before.

“All you Kageyama’s really are amazing.”

Shigeo flushed, puffing his cheeks out slightly and looking away, and Teru piped up from beside him with a bright smile, “Right?”

Meanwhile, Kenji seemed extra energetic, switching between walking normally and skipping every few seconds, and Kyouka seemed pretty content herself as well. 

“I’m guessing you two had fun in the escape room then?” Ranpo laughed, watching the two glance over at him when he spoke. “I envy you, Kyouka, you’re going to have the shower all to yourself!”

“You should enjoy it while it lasts, after all that sweating, y’know,” Kenji added on. “But yes, it was fun. I never could’ve thought they’d be able to replicate a whole oven into a room!”

“An oven...into a room?” Poe echoed slowly, then he remembered the long retelling of their tale from Shou and gasped. “It was an oven?”

“Suzuki can talk a lot about something and still be pretty vague,” Kyouka hummed, nodding to confirm that the room was, in fact, a giant oven simulation.

“And that was for children?”

“Why are you only concerned now?” Kyouka raised a brow.

Poe pursed his lips, gripping at the ends of his vest nervously, and mumbled, “He does talk fast for a small boy.”

“He’s not always like that, I think he was just excited.”

“I bet he could really hold a conversation with a cow with all that energy,” Kenji said, almost like he had done that himself once as well, and as if to prove it, he continued, “I’ve done it once or twice myself back in the day.”

“Dude you’ve talked to a cow?” Shou suddenly cut in rather rudely, but it was hard to be mad at him for all at that genuine excitement.

“I used to farm 'em,” Kenji replied easily, happy to see that Shou was interested.

“Oh my god, Ritsu’s brother will lose his absolute shit if he hears that,” Shou snickered, then he turned, walking off so he could drag Shigeo over. “Kenji used to farm cows!”

“ _What_?” Shigeo whispered, and his eyes were so glittery, it made Kenji think he might’ve been close to crying.

“Are they your favorite animals too?” Kenji grinned.

“Not really, I like frogs more, but did you get to have milk everyday?”

“Oh definitely! Though, we didn’t go milking them everyday of course, just so many of them we tend to have too much left!”

Teru looked a bit tensed seeing how excited Shigeo was getting over the ex-cow farmer, and swooped in to wrap an arm around his boyfriend, “Wow, Shigeo, don’t go falling in love with another blonde just because he used to farm cows!”

“Oh don’t worry, Teru, I would never!” Kenji laughed, holding his hands up to his chest in defense. “You two make a lovely couple!”

Teru blushed bashfully, scratching the back of his head, “T-Thank you!”

“Ugh, I feel like I’m third wheeling in a romance sitcom,” Doutei scrunched his nose up.

“Pretty kid thing of you to say, not going to lie,” Reigen remarked, watching Doutei shoot him back with a deadpan look. 

“Aren’t you a little bit uncomfortable or awkward with the fact that everyone here but us two are in a relationship?” Doutei frowned at how well-fitted the man was in this situation. He wasn’t completely sure with everyone’s relationship status, but seeing as there were obvious pairs in the group, he assumed most of them were probably dating.

“I’ve got lovers back home, getting married soon,” Reigen answered easily and Doutei groaned. Reigen snorted, realizing how immature Doutei could get at times, it was nice to see he kept a few childish aspects of himself. “Never had a crush before?”

Doutei’s face dusted pink, but not too noticeably, and he averted eye contact, “Just once. A colleague. She looked like she was about my age, I guess, and as it turns out, she wasn’t.”

“How old was she actually?”

“Twenty-eight.”

Reigen pressed his lips into a thin line and widened his eyes, looking away. He was not going to touch on that, not at all.

“You just made the same reaction Zombieman did when I told him that!” Doutei huffed accusingly. “It’s not funny.”

“It isn’t.” Reigen nodded, yet trying so hard not to break down into laughter now that Doutei mentioned it. Then he took a deep breath, closing his eyes so he’d stop thinking about how funny Doutei’s first crush seemed from afar, and reopened them with a smile, “You kids want to take that bath first before dinner?”

“That’s if you’re going to lend us your bathroom as well, or we’d probably never finish in time with just one bathroom,” Teru replied.

“And if Teru goes last because we’ll definitely never finish in time if he doesn’t.” Ritsu added along, and Teru flushed in embarrassment. He grew a bit redder when Shigeo seemed to have nodded in agreement.

“Do you want us to get you anything while you’re in the shower?” Saitama asked, his question mostly directed at his brothers. Shigeo didn’t really need to say anything for him to know that he’d love a glass, or carton, of warm milk. Ritsu shook his head. “Okay. Don’t take too long in the shower.”

“Yeah, Teru,” Shou nudged the blonde.

“Shove off, Shou.” Teru sighed.

Reigen snapped his finger, suddenly remembering something and pointed at his kids, “You said you guys won, right? Did you…?”

“Right here,” Teru dug into his pocket and waved the cheque, and he could literally see the kanji word ‘money’ in Reigen’s eyes. “It’s just a million each though but...uh...you can have it. Since you...y’know…”

Ritsu so badly wanted to strangle Teru to death, because the blonde had done exactly what he had expected. It was too bad Ritsu didn’t know the full story behind it though, otherwise, he might’ve not been so angry.

“Ah, it’s okay, kid,” Reigen laughed, dismissing the cheque. “We’ll put it into your bank account when we get home. It’s yours anyway.”

* * *

“Just the two of us now, eating dinner,” Ranpo said slowly, trying to lead Poe into a conversation. Genos and Saitama had long finished their dinner since the eldest Kageyama wanted to heat up a glass bottle of milk for Shigeo using Genos’ hands, and Reigen wanted to get some work done on his laptop back in the hotel room.

“I noticed,” Poe chuckled, poking around at his food before taking a bite.

“You’ve been pretty quiet all day, to be honest.”

“I’m always quiet.”

Ranpo scrunched his face up, frowning. His boyfriend could be so smart and so dumb sometimes, “But you’re bothered about something.”

“Greatest detective as always.” Poe hummed, not denying the fact that something _was_ bothering him.

“Tell me what’s wrong,” Ranpo said very straightforwardly.

Poe chewed on the inside of his cheek, tapping his spoon against his mashed potatoes in silence.

“Don’t make me use my detective powers on you!”

That sort of cracked Poe up, and he smiled softly, releasing his spoon and leaving it in his potatoes. “It’s stupid, I’m not super worried about it anymore.”

“Then it really shouldn’t be a problem telling me.”

Poe sighed. It looked like Ranpo wasn’t going to give up convincing Poe to spill the beans, so with another heavy sigh, he leaned back against his chair, “For a moment, I thought you were going to start liking L more than you like me.”

“What?!” Ranpo stood up, and the last few people who were eating nearby turned their heads towards him in a mixture of annoyance and surprise. Poe pulled him back down onto his chair with a panicked frown, shooting everyone around them who saw and heard an apologetic look. Ranpo folded his arms, foot tapping, “Why would you think that?”

“Our whole relationship, like _whole_ relationship, started because I managed to keep up with you as a rival,” Poe explained, realizing how ridiculous he was going to sound. “So after you discovered how smart L was, I was worried that...you’ll start viewing him as your new rival and then later on…” Ugh, it really was dumb. Ranpo didn’t just like Poe for his brain after all...right?

“You’re right.”

“Wh-What?” Poe nearly screamed, his heart seizing up at the mere suggestion that Ranpo might be--

“But, y’know, L isn’t you. So I wouldn’t have fallen that deep in love. Besides, we have too many similarities, it gets a bit freaky. Maybe if I met him before you, something might’ve happened. But it didn’t, and instead, I’m totally smitten for you.” Ranpo took Poe’s spoon and scooped himself a spoonful of mashed potatoes for himself. “Don’t worry so much, Edgar Allen Poe, I wouldn’t go for anyone but you.”

“Don’t scare me like that!” Poe hissed, sweat trickling down his neck from panic. “As honest as always, Edogawa Ranpo.”

“Your reaction was pretty funny though, subtle jealousy looks good on you.”

“Hopefully I won’t have it often.”

* * *

“Thank you, Nii-san, goodnight,” Shigeo took the heated up bottle of milk with its cap already halfway opened and left their hotel room, hair still slightly wet from the shower.

Saitama smiled, closing the door once Shigeo had left, and turned to face the hotel room, which only had one bed, “We’ve reached the inevitable conclusion here.”

“I can sleep on the floor.” Reigen said, already grabbing the second pillow on the bed and flopping it onto the ground.

“No! You’ve already got enough bad backaches already.”

Reigen frowned, a little offended, “I feel a little called out here. But I’ll be fine.”

“If anyone, it should really be me that sleeps on the floor,” Genos said, taking the logical approach. “Considering I don’t need comfortability to fall asleep.”

“It’s a bit inappropriate for two grown men who are in a relationship with someone else to sleep in the same bed,” Reigen deadpanned. “Not to mention you’re here. Won’t it be awkward?”

“I second Taka’s opinion,” Saitama said from the door. “Taka you can take the bed and I’ll--”

“No one will have a sore body if you both let me take the floor and share the queen-sized bed,” Genos protested.

“Why are you so eager to let us share the bed?” Saitama asked, eyes squinted.

“Because you two need a soft surface to sleep well on while I don’t.”

Reigen held his hands up, an idea falling upon him, “Let’s rock paper scissors, whoever wins we’ll go with his idea.”

They all agreed before suddenly remembering that they were challenging a _cyborg_ , so it was only natural that Genos won, and it would be useless to back down since Reigen had brought up the idea and Saitama was too tired to continue arguing. 

“I promise I will keep to my side the whole night,” Reigen _bowed,_ and Saitama couldn’t even tell if he was joking. Regardless, he bowed back as well, making the same respectful promise.

“Please don’t be dramatic you two,” Genos shook his head and sighed.

* * *

“I spy, with my little eye, something absolutely adorable,” Shou said, staring right at the ceiling in the middle of the dark. Squishing right between him and Ritsu was Doutei, who looked like he couldn’t wait to fall asleep right now.

“Shigeo,” Teru answered sleepily, arms draped over the smaller boy, who was already dozing off.

“Wrong, it was Ritsu,” Shou shifted for the hundredth time since he got into bed.

“Please sleep, Shou,” Ritsu groaned, not even in the mood to feel flattered at the moment. “I didn’t fix my sleep schedule only for you to screw it up again.”

“Are goggles mermaid versions of glasses?”

“Shut up, please I am begging you--”

“Do bugs just know they can walk up on walls when they are born or do they do it accidentally one day and go, “Yooooooo”?”

Doutei wished he had stayed with Genos and Saitama, he really did.

* * *

After managing to drag Kenji back to his hotel room, Kyouka went to bed with slightly sore arms. She knew Kenji would practically drop dead and fall asleep after having a full stomach, but she never knew he’d also sleep like a log. It was really awkward having to half drag and half carry him back to his room, and she was lucky no one was there to see it, because to an outsider, it looked extremely suspicious. 

She climbed into bed with her soft pajamas and pulled the covers up to her torso, then she proceeded to just lie there. It was pretty lonely, having a whole room to herself, and even though Atsushi slept in the closet, she never felt alone when she went to bed back at home. Sleeping alone reminded her of those _dark, dark_ times. 

Every time she came close to falling asleep, her eyes would suddenly fly open in panic, and then it would take a while for her to remember where she was and she’d be back to square one with sleep.

Her phone buzzed on the nightstand and she immediately sat up, still wide awake but oh so tired as well. She took her phone into her hands and flipped it open, already knowing who the message was from.

 **Atsushi** **  
** Hope you had a fun time, sleep well! (☆｀• ω •´)ｂ

 **Izumi Kyouka**  
I did. Thank you.

 **Nakajima Atsushi**  
Oh, I actually didn’t think you’d be awake right now Σ(゜゜) Aren’t you tired from the long day?

 **Izumi Kyouka**  
Yes.

 **Nakajima Atsushi**  
Homesick?

Kyouka stared at her screen in the dark, shoulders hunched and her feet dangling off the side of the bed. She guessed he could say that, she did miss the comfort of the dorm room and Atsushi’s presence. It made her feel safe. 

**Izumi Kyouka** **  
** A little bit, yes.

 **Nakajima Atsushi** **  
** I’m sorry I can’t do anything to help, try to get some sleep okay? (´• ᴗ •̥`✿) Let me know if you need anything tho!!

 **Izumi Kyouka**  
I will, thank you. Goodnight, nii-san.

 **Nakajima Atsushi**  
You too, imouto-kun (ෆ˙ᵕ˙ෆ)♡

That left a small smile on Kyouka’s face for a while, and she turned her phone off, leaving it on the nightstand. She slept easier after that.

* * *

It started with Matt climbing into Mello’s bed and complaining that it was cold, even when he pulled his covers up, and the blonde had hissed and tried to push the other off. He gave in after Matt had successfully resisted for ten minutes straight, and scooted away from Matt as much as possible on his cramped bed.

Then Near squeezed himself onto Mello’s bed as well, using the same exact excuse Matt had used, and proceeded to play with Mello’s hair.

So there Mello was, squished between Matt and Near, and he knew one of them was bound to fall off at some point, so he sat up and climbed out of his bed. The two watched as he chose between Near’s toy infested bed and Matt’s suspiciously dirtied with crumbs bed, and went with Near’s. 

The bed screeched against the floorboard as he pushed it, and if it weren’t for his tired, grumpy mood, he would’ve been more careful with the noise. Combining his bed and Near’s, he climbed back into bed and forcefully rolled Near over back into his toy filled bed.

“There, now we have some space.” Mello said, falling onto his pillow with a big huff.

“Won’t the small gap be a bit uncomfortable?” Matt whispered.

“It’s barely noticeable. Do you want to sleep together or not?” He didn’t bother with phrasing, nor did he care that it sounded a bit embarrassing, as long as his two dumb friends were warm or whatever and he got a good night’s rest, all of this could be endured. 

“You’re a lot nicer than I imagined.”

“You’ll see how nice I am when I knock you out with my fist.”

“Alright then, good night to you.”

* * *

There was a knock on her door, which woke her up, and for a moment, she couldn’t remember where she was or what she was doing here for. It came back to her in a blink, and her tensed body immediately softened back into bed, then she heard the knock again.

“Kyouka, you awake? Do you want to get breakfast together?” Kenji’s voice was muffled through the door, which may suggest he might be pressing his face against the door to avoid shouting in the hallway. 

She rolled out of bed, opening the door, which caused Kenji to stumble forward a little, confirming that he _was_ pressing his face against the door earlier. It seemed...oddly cute, to be honest. 

“Ah! Kyouka, did I wake you?” Kenji smiled, and even though the sentence was structured in a way that sounded like an apology, he didn’t sound apologetic at all. She didn’t mind.

“Mhm. It’s okay though, I’ll get ready and we can get breakfast. Together.” Kyouka said, already having the sleep shaken out of her. “Give me six minutes.”

“Wow, that’s really specific. Okay, I’ll wait.” Kenji did a spin and leaned against the wall next to the door. Kyouka felt bad having him wait outside, but Atsushi would always do the same as well, even if he was in his pajamas.

“Sorry,” she found herself saying and he shook his head, laughing lightly.

“It’s okay, I can wait.”

True to her words, Kyouka really did take six minutes to get ready, which was astonishingly fast, and Kenji was almost surprised to see her open the door in her usual outfit, not a single hair out of place.

“You’re as pretty as a water lily, like always,” Kenji complimented brightly and her face pinked, nodding a soft thank you back. “Oh, and thank you for carrying me back to the room. I didn’t notice I fell asleep at the table last night.”

“It’s no problem.” Kyouka said, making her way towards the hotel elevator. She remembered seeing pancakes on the cafe menu once and was planning to have that for breakfast since yesterday.

It was only when they entered the hotel’s cafe did they realize how early it was. It was pretty normal for them to be up at this hour considering this was when they woke up for work, so they hadn’t realized it was okay for them to sleep in a little late today.

Kenji laughed, and it echoed slightly throughout the almost empty cafe, causing some of the other early birds to look up for a brief moment before returning back to whatever they were doing. “At least we can eat in peace then!”

Kyouka nodded in response, already walking towards the counter to order herself a concerning amount of pancakes.

* * *

“Mm, no, I wasn’t in any real danger,” Doutei spoke to the earpiece in one of his ears as he brushed his teeth. He paused to gurgle water before spitting it out and continuing, “I wasn’t all that scared anyways, it was sorta easy to tell it was all fake.”

Another pause.

“Relax, Zombieman, I’m having fun.” Doutei chuckled, leaving the bathroom to finally let Ritsu use it, who had woken up after him only minutes ago. They were all trying to use the bathroom as fast as possible before Teru could hog it all to himself, even though they really had no proof that he would. Still, better safe than sorry.

The moment Ritsu was inside, Teru stirred, and Doutei took this as his cue to leave.

“Welp, I’m going to grab breakfast. See you!” Doutei waved, not wanting to stay and hear the four (or maybe three, considering how Shigeo was always on the sidelines) bicker about. 

Ritsu hummed in acknowledgement as he heard the hotel door close, and he pulled on his not-so-obvious eyebags with irritation. Minor things like these always had him feeling uncomfortable sometimes, and he wished Tsubomi was here to help with his makeup. 

“And then you say I hog the toilet,” Teru snorted, leaning against the bathroom doorway. 

“I will list down all the times you’ve hogged our toilet back at home during your many sleepovers with Nii-san,” Ritsu growled, removing his finger from his face.

Teru didn’t respond, he only laughed some more, and despite only having just woken up seconds ago, he looked absolutely gorgeous with the sunlight seeping through the curtains from behind him. He almost looked like an angel, with the way the light made him shine, and Ritsu detested it.

* * *

It wasn’t that Reigen didn’t trust Serizawa with the office, heck, the man could trust Serizawa with his life. Literally. But he couldn’t help but feel worried sometimes, wondering how the office was doing without him. Maybe it was just a side effect of not wanting to be forgotten. Besides, he was on a call with Serizawa right now and everything sounded fine.

“Too bad ghosts can’t use phones, huh?” Reigen joked, leaning against the window of the hotel room. Saitama and Genos had long left before he had woken up, probably getting breakfast and whatnot. There was a brief pause on the line after that, and he pressed his phone closer to his ear, trying to catch any faint noises on the other line.

“Yeah but ghosts can possess people to talk on phones,” Serizawa finally replied, his tone slightly snarkier than his usual softness, which was a clear sign that Dimple had taken over to speak. 

“Good morning to you too,” Reigen chimed, as if he wasn’t just poking fun at Dimple earlier.

“Seriously, I get why Katsuya can’t come, but why not me?” Dimple huffed.

“Someone has to watch Tome.”

“She doesn’t need two people watching over her.”

Reigen raised an eyebrow, turning over so his back was against the window now, “Have you even met her before, Dimple?”

Another pause, then a strong exhale, “You’re right. She’s your kid, and you need two people watching over you too.”

“That’s a weak way of flirting,” Reigen grumbled.

“I wasn’t.” Reigen could practically hear the smirk Dimple was giving him through Serizawa’s face. 

Then Dimple’s voice changed, indicating that Serizawa was back in control, and he laughed nervously, “Well it was nice talking to you, Taka, but we have a client in a bit. See you back home soon?”

“Of course!” Reigen pushed himself off the window, getting ready to leave the room.

“We love you.”

Reigen smiled, feeling his heart flutter, “Love you too.”

When he turned his phone off, keeping it into his pocket and smiling pretty widely, he opened the door to meet Ranpo’s exhausted face, clinging onto Poe as if the taller man was his pillow. Not the weirdest sight Reigen had ever seen, but it was still a little surprising. 

“Just passing by.” Poe awkwardly smiled, taking a few more steps forward, but with Ranpo clinging onto him and not making the effort to walk, it was pretty tough. “Ranpo, we’ve already slept in late enough, we need breakfast.”

“I know, I just want to be dragged by you until you give in and carry me,” Ranpo grinned playfully, hugging Poe’s arm tighter. Then he tilted his head to face Reigen, “How’s your office holding up? Are your fiances behaving?”

Reigen was a bit surprised that Ranpo knew he ran an office, but knowing the detective’s high intelligence, it was to be expected that he’d guess it on his own. He vaguely shrugged, giving Ranpo a small smile, and didn’t say anything more.

Ranpo stared for a moment, then went back to snuggling Poe’s arm, satisfied with Reigen’s answer. 

They took the elevator together in silence, and although Reigen prided himself in being a talkative man, he really didn’t have much to say to these two. He _could_ make the effort to know them more, but Poe seemed like the kind of person that would only open up if you approached him correctly or if you have enough patience to wait for him to be comfortable with you. Ranpo, ironically enough, was a man that probably kept secrets, so he was probably not worth cracking open. 

Not to mention that they probably already know enough about Reigen, so they have no need for making small talk, which seemed a bit unfair to Reigen.

“Poe’s a writer, you can find his work in some magazines sometimes,” Ranpo suddenly spoke up when the elevator door opened, causing Poe to turn to him in surprise. This time Ranpo was doing the dragging, holding Poe’s hand as they made their way to the cafe.

Reigen blinked, following behind them, “What do you usually write?”

“Ah, um,” Poe rubbed his thumb on the back of Ranpo’s hand, “poetry, short stories.”

“I won’t be surprised if Ritsu knew some of your works,” Reigen said, remembering how the boy loved reading literature.

Poe smiled bashfully, “It’s not...that famous.”

“We’ll see,” Ranpo hummed.

* * *

“Do it again, do it again!” Shou bounced and Genos made a face, but proceeded to oblige anyway.

Steadily, Genos raised his hand in the air, and on the count of three, Kenji tossed a piece of bread into the air. A quick and brief shot of fire was produced out of Genos’ raised hand, and the bread fell back onto the plate it was previously on, steaming and appetizingly toasted.

Another applause from the seven children that gathered around him.

Saitama was eating one of the pieces of toast, and he glanced over at the cashier, who looked either too unbothered or too terrified to tell them to stop. He then glanced back at the table of kids, all too amused by Genos’ ability to produce fire. What a way to start the day.

“Why are you so amused? You can very well do the same, y’know,” Ritsu huffed, yet eating the toast as well. 

“It’s cooler when Genos does it.” Shou answered, leaning over to take a bite out of the toast Ritsu was eating. “Also, is it just me, or am I being surrounded by the world’s most prettiest people ever? I feel insecure.”

“Aw, thank you,” Teru chuckled, causing Shigeo and Kyouka to feel breathless, and Ritsu swore he did that on purpose.

“Way to go at being humble, Reigen Hanazawa Teruki,” Ritsu rolled his eyes, then proceeded to just stuff his toast into Shou’s mouth when the ginger tried to get another bite again. 

“Reigen Hanazawa?” Kenji asked, vaguely remembering that Reigen was the adult that came with them. 

“Yeah, uh, he mentioned it before, but in a nutshell, he’s my adoptive dad,” Teru smiled, trying to cover up how embarrassing it felt to tell people that Reigen was his dad. “If you’re wondering what to call me, Teru’s just fine. But if you insist on being formal, Hanazawa works too.”

“Is there a reason you don’t want to drop your old family name?” Genos asked, genuinely curious. “Reigen Teruki doesn’t sound too bad, does it?”

“I dunno, sixteen long years with that name and...I don’t really want to let it go,” Teru propped his cheek on the back of his hand, elbow resting on the table, and with his other hand, he reached for a piece of toast and nibbled on the crust. 

Ritsu’s eyes suddenly brightened in realization, remembering what had happened last evening when Teru offered to give his cheque to Reigen. He must’ve wanted to use it as a thank you gift. He mentally smacked himself for being so stupid, and for once, realized that Reigen wasn’t so much of a bad guy after all. He _did_ help Teru out of the goodness of his heart.

“Ritsu! Do you remember reading anything written by Edgar A. Poe or Edgar A. Perry? In magazines, mostly.” Reigen walked over, arm in the air to wave for his attention, and was proceeded to be responded by a click of Ritsu’s tongue. No amount of goodwill could ever convince Ritsu to stop hating Reigen though, none at all.

Nevertheless, Ritsu made the effort to think back to the works he had read since last year, then tried harder to remember the ones he read when he was fourteen. “Are they in Japanese? I don’t read English all that much.”

Reigen turned his head to Poe, who frantically yelped and nodded yes. 

Ritsu drummed his fingers on the table, but he couldn’t remember reading anything that was written by that pen name, and right when he was about to shake his head and say no, Shou spoke up with a hint of confusion in his voice.

“I think you have. Or, I have at least.” Shou said, and Ritsu raised a brow at Shou, because he knew his ginger boyfriend was not the literature type. Then Shou continued, trying to jog Ritsu’s memory. “You wanted to improve your English for your entrance exams, so you had me scout for some English literature and I picked one of his works because it had an emo vibe to it.”

Oh, Ritsu sort of remembered that. His face tinged with pink, remembering how he had to ask Shou to repeat some sentences because he liked them, but pretended he just didn’t understand. 

“Emo vibe.” Poe said, not surprised or offended. 

“Hey, at least it entertained Ritsu,” Shou shrugged, then he dug into his pocket, bringing his phone out and swiped through his phone gallery. “I have a picture or something somewhere, here, it’s in English but...y’know.”

Reigen leaned over, and for a moment, he had no idea what he was looking at. His English was pretty rusty since he never had a use for it, though he still tried his best. Scanning the words, he quoted them, “ _Eagerly...I wished the morrow...vainly I had...s...sought to…_ Nope, I can’t.”

Shigeo was the only one that clapped for him, and he wasn’t aware that it looked awkward. Saitama snorted, taking the last piece of toast for himself, “Your voice kinda deepened when you read that.”

“It was so shit though,” Shou doubled over, laughing as he placed away his phone.

Reigen frowned, ears growing hot, and he turned to Poe, grumbling, “How about we ask the real American here?”

Poe blinked rapidly, though it couldn’t be seen through his bangs, and his body went a bit rigid, “Sorry. It’s just...you sound like...someone I used to know.”

“So was it good?”

“No...you sound like him if he had a thick Japanese accent and poor English.”

“Well.”

* * *

“Ugh, you suck,” Matt said, throwing his stack of UNO cards aside, and Near smiled smugly, stacking the cards that were in the middle pile with ease. Not even three minutes and Near had already won his fifth game of UNO in a row.

Mello looked like he was on the verge of throwing a fit, but kept his composure and slapped his two cards onto the pile, huffing loudly, “Why do we bother.”

“You were the one that asked for a rematch. Four times.” Matt snorted and Mello rolled his eyes at him. The only reason Matt stuck around to play was because Mello had complained that if it was just a 1v1 battle, it would’ve been unfair.

They were back in the waiting room and had just finished reviewing all of the new riddles and clues L made during a spur of creativity that was bestowed upon him at the dead of the night. The most they corrected were really minor grammar issues and rewrote some parts because the handwriting was barely legible, then had it handed back to him by passing it to Watari through the door.

Playing UNO was their last resort to cure boredom, after half an hour of Matt flinging marshmallows and little chocolates into Mello’s mouth, Near suggested that they could play UNO. Originally, Near wanted to use the deck to recreate the building the event was being held at, he even brought enough UNO cards to do so, but figured it was more fun to actually play with them.

Evidently, it wasn’t as fun as the trio had expected, so now they were back to square one.

“Should we go back to tossing food into Mello’s mouth?” Matt said, head dangling off the edge of his chair and his feet resting on the wall.

“I am not an animal,” Mello grumbled, lying on the ground with his arms and legs spread like a starfish. 

Sitting in his usual position on the coffee table, Near twirled a strand of hair with his finger, mumbling softly, “It’s not too early to leave the room, maybe we’ll bump into them.” ‘Them’ being Shigeo and the rest.

“You just want to see that blonde kid again,” Matt laughed, lifting his head slightly to get the blood out of his head.

Near pursed his lips, his cheeks pinking just a little, and he tugged lightly on his hair, “He’s aesthetically pleasing to the eyes.”

“Some weird way to say you have a crush.”

Near didn’t bother responding, opting to just stare blankly. Mello frowned, kicking his foot up at the back of Matt’s dangling head, “Hanazawa has a boyfriend. Mob.”

“Yeah, well, you two could be dating and I’d still have a crush on either of you,” Matt blinked, swatting Mello’s foot away.

Mello stared, a bit frazzled by the response, before it finally registered properly, and he flushed red. “You- I don’t- I- We--”

“It’s a hypothetical thing,” Matt grinned, struggling not to laugh. He was never the type to poke fun at other kids, heck, sometimes he never bothered with other kids, his attention span could never last that long. But something about hanging out with these two captivated him, it kept him entertained and pretty fuzzy inside whenever he interacted with them.

“Doesn’t have to be hypothetical,” Near said quietly, so quiet, it was almost as if he hadn’t meant to blurt that out. The room went still, with only the casual humming of the AC in the air. He was twirling that strand of hair so much it worried the other two that he might accidentally tear it off his head, and the longer the silence grew, the more Near curled and pulled and flushed. “Was it too soon? We haven’t known each other for long, it’s only been weeks, I know, but...I...wasn’t joking or anything.”

“Yeah of course you weren’t joking!” Matt sat up properly, flipping himself over the right way up on the chair. “Those weeks were long enough for me to know that you don’t joke often. I was just--”

“Surprised that you could be that smooth,” Mello finished, and Near hadn’t realized how beautiful Mello could blush sometimes. It was so easy to see too, because Mello always insisted on wearing sleeveless shirts and vests and he _knew_ he pulled it off well, so you could always see the blush spread down to his shoulders when he was really red. Right now was such an example.

“Well we aren’t going to be fourteen forever, better to fall in love now than later, am I right?” Matt said, shooting the two of them a bright grin. “The three of us, I mean. We click so well, don’t we?”

“I didn’t take you for a romantic.” Mello deadpanned.

“Neither did I until I met you.”

Mello shot upwards, hair sticking out at odd angles from shifting around on the ground, “You two are going to be the death of me.”

“Is that a yes?” Near asked, already on board with the idea. Teru and Shigeo made dating look so easy, so surely the three of them could master it as well. 

“You’re smart, aren’t you?” Mello scoffed, then he smiled, which could’ve easily gone unnoticeable if the other two weren’t so observant.

* * *

“Do you three mind watching over the kids for us?” Reigen asked, though extremely reluctantly. L needed Ranpo and Reigen to help out, and when he meant help out, L meant he needed them to make the challenge more _enticing_ by misleading people and distracting them. He chose Reigen because of his high people skills, and Ranpo because he and L matched in IQ.

Saitama and Genos agreed, because really, they had nothing else to do, and watching over children who could watch over themselves wasn’t all that bad. Poe nearly protested, since he was barely good with kids, and it felt more suitable for him to help out as well, but L insisted, with not much sensitivity, that they didn’t need him. Which really hurt, to be honest, but Poe agreed to it in the end.

So as the three left, the babysitting trio hung back with the group of ten kids, who were already buzzing and chatting about with Near and the rest.

“Here’s the plan: I’m going to force you to shop with us,” Teru pointed a finger at Mello the moment they made eye contact. Mello blinked rapidly in confusion, not sure where that came from. Then Teru speed walked over, grabbing Mello’s face and examining it up close. “You really don’t wear makeup.” Teru breathed in surprise.

Mello slapped Teru’s hands away, hissing, “I’m not some barbie doll you can dress up.”

“There’s a ToysRUs.” Teru quickly added, and even though he was facing Mello when he said this, everyone knew this fact was more directed at Near, whose eyes lit up in interest. “We split into two groups, the clothing gang and the stuffed animals one.”

“Why do you sound like you’ve been planning this since last year?” Doutei narrowed his eyes at Teru with suspicion.

“Irrelevant, you three are joining us.” Teru declared and Matt, Near, and Mello exchanged looks. They had a silent discussion that involved a lot of shrugging and head tilts, before finally, Near nodded at Teru, who beamed like he had expected that answer. “Lovely! Let’s go, let’s go!”

“We can never go somewhere without Teru screaming about a shopping spree,” Ritsu pinched the bridge of his nose, trying to get rid of the headache rising, because he just knew Shou would somehow make it a mission to become banned from the mall.

“Does that mean you’re going to look at toys?” Saitama asked a genuine question, but Ritsu flushed and took full offense anyway.

“I”m not- I’m going to look at clothes too! Mello...he dresses well.” 

Saitama raised a brow, glancing over at Mello, then back at Ritsu, “Leather.”

“It’s a nice contrast to his bright bleached hair.”

Shou glanced up at Genos, then at Teru, then at Mello, “A contrast to bright bleach hair. Is that your type?” Something Shou clearly lacked.

“I will smack love and affection into you if you suggest that one more time,” Ritsu glared.

* * *

“Say, Teru really is beautiful, huh?” Kenji held up a stuffed cow with awe, reminiscing about his old farm life. He considered maybe buying the plush if Poe let him. 

Ah, the conversation Shigeo had been waiting for since yesterday, it really was inevitable. He hummed in agreement, jabbing his finger into a giant frog plush gently.

Teru was the kind of person that got more beautiful the older he grew, so it was no surprise that people eyed the blonde more and more each passing year.

“Kyouka, you think so too, don’t you?” Kenji smiled, putting the cow down. The girl, who had been trying to see how many bunny plushies she could carry with her two arms, glanced over and blushed lightly.

“Like the morning sun,” she said, hands curling, squeezing the toys softly. “You’re like the afternoon sun though.”

“Aw, thank you. You’re kinda like Atsushi, did you know that? You both have a pretty moonlight beauty,” Kenji easily replied, which made Kyouka wonder if he knew what he was saying, because it awfully sounded like he might be flirting. She had seen enough interactions between Teru and Shigeo to know how it worked.

The flower compliment from this morning could’ve easily been a normal compliment, but this was the second time he had said something nice about her appearance. Maybe she was thinking too much, and maybe the reason she found Teru attractive was because of his blonde hair and sunny smile.

She felt like a moth at times, always being drawn to the light.

“Y’know, of all times, they really had to pick now to do confessions.” Doutei was getting real tired of romance. It wasn’t that he didn’t like it or anything, because sometimes he did feel happy for the couples around him, but it got overwhelming pretty fast. It was an equivalent to watching his parents flirt. “I really should’ve brought a friend around my age, good thing you’re here though.”

“I’m thirteen.” Near said, knowing that Doutei had assumed he was younger due to his height and appearance.

Doutei huffed, mumbling under his breath, “Not again.” 

The albino didn’t quite understand what that meant, only managing to guess a small fraction of the context.

Matt poked his head out from the LEGO section, holding box upon boxes of LEGO sets with a wide grin on his face, “Hey, I have an idea.”

* * *

It really did hit differently being surrounded by kids who admired clothes as much as Poe did, especially when one of them also had the same taste in literature as him. Ritsu reminded Poe of himself before the fall, back when he was a confident man who loved writing and wearing heel boots.

He still was that man, but things had changed, so he wasn’t exactly the same anymore.

“Y’know, I’ve probably read more of your stuff before, when I was younger,” Shou said, leaning against a clothing rack while Ritsu thumbed through the clothes on the other side. “Most of the places my dad made me go to had English as their first language, so the magazines I used to read were all in English.”

“But you’re Japanese?” Poe asked, taking note of how Shou looked. He did seem like a foreigner, with his flaming red hair and the way he dressed.

“Oh yeah definitely. I don’t look it, don't I? It’s probably the psychic powers.” Shou pulled at the bottom of his eye, showing off his sparkly blue-green eyes. “I actually didn’t know you were an American until Reigen talked about your writing. Bangs and all covering half your face, and your accent isn’t there.”

“His clothes gave it away,” Ritsu murmured, still looking through the clothes, which made Shou think that Ritsu wasn’t planning on picking anything.

Shou frowned, resting his cheek against his arm, “I guess.”

“Little Brother! What color?” Teru walked over, holding up the two hangers to his chest and smiling brightly.

“Whichever that won’t give me blindness,” Ritsu replied, eyes still glued onto the same clothing rack.

“All you ever wear are dark colors,” Teru huffed, returning back to where he had gotten the two shirts from. Mello turned up his nose in disgust, wondering how someone so physically pretty would go for an appearance so disdainful. Too bright colors, a bad mismatch of neon from different varieties, and the way they were stitched together made it seem like it came out of a five-year-old's drawing.

Yet Teru looked content with them, if not, extremely joyful, and Mello watched as Teru’s pile of ‘I-want-to-try-on-and-probably-buy’ clothes grew larger and larger each time Teru passed by it.

“Are you doing this on purpose?” Mello furrowed his brows, frowning deeply, and Teru cheerfully stopped what he was doing to look his way.

“What on purpose?”

“Purposely buying awful clothes because you know you look good in everything.”

Teru laughed, which only proved Mello’s assumption more. The esper picked a brightly, multicolored shirt up and held it to his chest, making Mello wince at the sight of it as Teru spoke, “You’re kinda right. I do look good in everything, but I don’t think these clothes are awful.”

“I feel like I uncovered some sort of dark secret.”

“Don’t be silly, I don’t hide it from friends. Back in Seasoning City, you’d be able to see me in all kinds of clothes,” Teru hummed, twirling about with a few chosen shirts and pants so he could try them on later. Mello blinked slowly, tracing his eyes over Teru’s figure. Somehow, Teru admitting he liked outlandish clothes made him seem...more human. There was always this certain glow around Teru that made him look untouchable, perfect, but seeing him now, with such an ugly taste in fashion…

Mello doubled over in laughter, and Teru paused in confusion, looking his way, and wondered if he had said something funny to Mello earlier. Mello really couldn’t wait to tell Near about this, the idea of shattering Near’s rose tinted view of Teru seemed alluring to him all of a sudden.

“Sorry,” Mello caught his breath, calming down and wiped the corner of his eye. “It’s just--”

“I get it.” Teru smiled softly, and for a moment, Mello thought Teru was referring to his plan on revealing the “big news” to Near, until Teru continued. “You...and your friends...probably thought I was some cut-out Prince Charming, huh? I get that. A lot. You can ask Ritsu. It’s best that you discover my imperfections now before your idea of me gets too large.”

“Oh, I get it. That’s why you’re dating bowl-cut?” Mello pointed and Teru’s whole body went rigid, he saw a flash of anger in Teru’s eyes, one that said that he wasn’t a stranger to fights, so he quickly added, “He’s a genuine person. He doesn’t have major expectations for anyone, not even for you, his boyfriend.”

Teru immediately softened back into a gentle smile, and nodded, “He’s wonderful.”

“I’m sure he is,” Mello forced a smile. He really wanted to get back to his two...wow, they were his boyfriends now. It felt weird calling them that in his head, he wondered if it would be the same if he said it out loud.

* * *

It was a miracle finding a big enough area in the mall to start their little project, Matt assumed it was probably because of the Kira event, but didn’t stop to think much further into it as he began to open up his first LEGO set box, pouring it all out.

They had all combined their money together, even using a bit of their prize money, to afford all these boxes of LEGO, just so they could combine it all and build the biggest structure they can with it. They planned for it to be as tall as the ceiling, which wouldn’t be a problem since they had Shigeo to use his powers and help, though they weren’t exactly sure if they had enough.

Near was confident that they did, and he was the one that had counted and recounted the number of boxes bought, even checking with Saitama and Genos to see if they were willing to pay that much. Saitama was reluctant at first, but Genos was intrigued and gave in. 

“Even if we don’t have enough, I’m sure Poe can chip in if we ask him!” Kenji had cheerfully added when Near was calculating the total amount in his head.

“Just how rich is this guy?” Doutei soured at the thought of using the poor guy’s money once again.

“Last I heard, he didn’t mind throwing away twenty million yen once!”

Doutei’s eye twitched, completely baffled.

Once they were done gathering all the blocks together, including the flat pieces and furniture-like pieces, they began planning how they’d go about building it. Near had collected all the LEGO characters for himself, lying flat on his belly and giving all the characters names and new names.

“Would be fun to create a ferris wheel,” Matt grinned, tapping his foot on the ground in thought.

“Can’t, not enough round pieces,” Near said, rolling over and kicking his feet in the air. “Unless you want to go for a blocky look.”

“A building?” Shigeo suggested.

“Too boring,” Matt sighed, it would be a waste as well. They had so many interesting blocks they could use, some translucent pieces, a few brightly colored ones, it would be a shame not to use them.

“Maybe we can model someone,” Near said, still lying flat on his back. Then he held up his hand, making ‘L’ gestures with them and closed an eye. He framed each person with his hands, like he was holding a camera, even though they were all upside down in his vision, and mumbled, “Someone interesting.”

He paused at Kyouka and she blinked slowly, before he raised his hands up to the thing hovering above her. If Near was surprised, he sure didn’t show it, because all he did was stare blankly at it. 

Everyone looked up as well, and that was when they noticed it, which was a bit funny considering its size and how long it had been there. Kyouka glanced over at Demon Snow briefly, before looking back at the others, “Don’t mind her. That’s just my ability, Demon Snow. I was borrowing her hands to help carry.” So that explained how Kyouka managed to carry so much.

“Let’s build a statue of her,” Near blurted, already able to see which piece would match which part of the ability. There was an ominous blue glow to the being, yet a good percentage of her was white, not to mention those bright yellow eyes.

He quickly scooped all of his new LEGO toys up and went over to Saitama, dumping them all into his jacket hoodie for safekeeping, “Take care of them for me.” Then went back to begin the blueprinting. 

Saitama dug into his pockets just to get a feel of how many toys there were in there, and was immediately pricked by some of them, “Huh. I can’t believe they fit inside.”

“Do you want me to hold some for you?” Genos asked, opening his palms.

“No, it’s okay. It’s kinda like…” Saitama tapped his chin. “It’s like I’m a hen. And my pockets are the nest, and the toys are my eggs.”

“That is a strange analogy.”

“But it’s what it’s like.” Saitama said, then he patted the toys in his jacket. “That Near kid is kinda...kiddish compared to Doutei.”

Genos watched as the kids began to start the groundwork of the LEGO statue replica of Demon Snow, and nodded, “Responsible too, very intelligent from what I analyzed.”

“A weird balance,” Saitama noted. “I always thought kids who were smart were all like Doutei.”

It didn’t take them too long to complete a quarter of the statue, with Near being experienced enough to do most of the work himself while the others chipped in as much as possible. Doutei found it enjoyable too, since he wasn’t a stranger to building things either, and worked on other complicated parts of the statue to speed up the process.

When Teru and the rest found them, they were pretty close to finishing already, thanks to Shigeo’s telekinesis, and Kenji ended up helping by lifting Near and Doutei up to certain places they couldn’t reach themselves.

Mello looked pretty cheerful, carrying three bags in his arms, the most he got were jeans and more sleeveless vest jackets. Ritsu had gotten new makeup, a bunch of hoodies, and a spoon, which confused Mello more than it should have. Shou only got pins and keychains, pinning the pins to his jacket so he’d have less to carry, and Teru looked like he had bought the entire store, because the amount of bags he was carrying, including the ones he was using telekinesis to carry, was astronomical.

All Poe got was a pen and a pair of boots with heels, and even though he was happy about it, he was more worried about the amount of clothes Teru had gotten. He wondered how the boy was going to bring it back to Seasoning City. Would it even fit the train’s luggage area?

He also didn’t know how to feel about being the one that had paid a quarter of Teru’s stuff. He wasn’t exactly bullied into paying, moreso that he felt bad when Teru’s face had paled and darkened at the total amount, and was about to put some of the stuff away when Poe offered to help. 

The boy looked happy though, so it wasn’t a total waste of money.

“Ah! Welcome back!” Kenji suddenly turned, causing Near -who was sitting on his shoulder- to sway around and grip Kenji’s head to avoid falling off. “Wow, Teru, that sure is a lot of clothes!”

“I got a frog hoodie for Shigeo too!” Teru said, and the bag that contained the hoodie hovered towards Shigeo, who took it with slight excitement in his eyes. Teru chuckled at the sight, then looked up at the almost-done statue of Demon Snow with awe, “Looks like you’re all having fun, huh?”

“Ha ha, do you think it’s possible for us to carry it out?” Matt laughed, only partially joking, since there was no way they could keep it around forever.

Near patted Kenji’s head so he could turn back towards the statue, and twirled a few strands of his white hair in thought, “I suppose we could carry it out, but I’m sure bringing it back to Kyouka’s home would be an issue. Unless we’re all okay with dismantling it.”

Shigeo looked a bit taken aback when Near mentioned taking it apart once they were done. He personally didn’t mind what they would do with it after they were done, since he was doing it for Near and for fun, but it was surprising to hear Near say he didn’t mind either, when he was the one that looked most excited in building it.

Upon noticing Shigeo’s reaction from the corner of his eye, Near pursed his lips, placing down a few more blocks, before speaking, “Don’t worry. I do that all the time. Back home.”

“Yeah, and it gets annoying when he does it so close to the door,” Mello huffed, walking over to scale the LEGO statue. “What, or who, is this anyway?”

Near nodded his head at Kyouka and Mello raised a brow in confusion. The blonde turned back to Near, then at the statue, and added, “That looks nothing like her.”

“Look up,” Near simply replied, and Matt snickered when Mello’s eyes trailed back to Kyouka, then tilted his head up.

“Ah.” Mello said, a pitch too high. 

“That’s Kyouka’s ability, Demon Snow.” Kenji explained cheerfully, bouncing as he did, which caused Near to yet again grab Kenji’s head for balance.

Saitama had taken pictures of their progress like a proud parent the whole time and sent all of them to Reigen, which probably might’ve made Reigen’s phone buzz like hell. So as the kids continued to talk among themselves, he waved Poe over, who looked behind himself in confusion, before pointing at himself, and Saitama sighed, nodding his head. 

“Uhm, yes?” Poe walked over, gripping his shopping bags a bit too tight. Something about Saitama’s blank face sort of disturbed him, maybe it was the fact that he couldn’t read his expression well, and therefore had no idea what the man was thinking. 

“Y’want some of these pics?” Saitama waved his phone, before scrolling through the photos that had Kenji and Kyouka in it. There was one where Kenji had Near clinging onto his raised arm like it was a pull-up bar, and one where Kyouka posed along with Demon Snow, and another where Kenji made a sad looking LEGO flower for Kyouka, who received it with a bright, blushy look of appreciation. 

Poe smiled softly at them, and he supposed the people from the Agency would love to see some of those photos, so he nodded his head. “Sure.”

“Okay, what’s your number? I’ll send them to you.”

“Oh, uh, here,” Poe fumbled through his coat pockets and pulled out his phone, which looked fairly expensive, and Saitama felt a punch stronger than his own in his broke gut.

They exchanged numbers, and there were a few series of buzzes from Poe’s phone after that. 

“Let’s try bringing it to the event to show it to Ranpo and Reigen first before taking it down,” Doutei suggested while being levitated in the air by Shigeo, then waved his hands upwards, and Shigeo lifted him higher. “So, y’know, they’d be proud and stuff.”

“For a hero, you sure do sound like you don’t get enough praise,” Shou snorted, before being painfully nudged by Ritsu. “What? I wasn’t insulting him or anything!”

Doutei huffed, waving his hand to the left, and Shigeo moved him accordingly, “I get praises everyday.”

“No you don’t, they praise you for being a hero, and not what you really are. You get complimented for saving the city or whatever, but never for other stuff,” Shou said, unconsciously pushing Doutei’s buttons. He’d done the same with Ritsu before, and Ritsu liked to call it Shou’s rare and painful honesty. 

The younger boy frowned with distaste, mostly because Shou was right, but didn’t bother continuing the conversation, and thankfully, neither did Shou. 

Near twirled his hair, pausing a bit in thought, before placing down a few more blocks. He was finishing up the LEGO katana, and he felt rather proud about this particular statue, maybe because he had built it with friends. “I guess we could bring it back to show it to them.”

“Wish we could’ve found a way to make the rest of her glow,” Matt sighed, fiddling with a switch in hand, its wire connected to the inside of LEGO Demon Snow’s head, going in through the nape of its neck and under its blocky hair. With a quick flip of the switch, its eyes instantly lit up in a bright yellow glow.

“Oh that’s lovely,” Poe breathed, scanning it up and down in astonishment. He was no builder, but he could tell how well made it was, from the details in the hair to the small folds of the clothes. “Hopefully Ranpo won’t get too amazed and beg for us to take it back.”

Doutei shot a thumbs up to Shigeo below him and was promptly placed back down on the ground. He adjusted his backpack straps, smiling widely at the LEGO statue they made with a sense of achievement, “Do you think a security guard would come get us for building this inside the mall?”

“Ah, don’t worry about that, Genos had that problem solved,” Saitama reassured, and Genos nodded. All the cyborg really did was glare at anyone that might disrupt the children’s building session, and made a show that he won’t hesitate to fight for their peace time if any security guards even made a _single_ effort in trying to stop them.

“Okay, looks like we’re done then.” Doutei held his hand out and his backpack produced a lollipop for him to lick on, walking around the LEGO Demon Snow to check for errors.

Near nodded after being placed down by Kenji, taking a step back with his hands behind his back, “I like this one. Mob, is it okay…?”

“Oh, let me help!” Teru said, stepping in like a knight in shining armor. 

“You’ve already got enough on your hands, I can do it,” Shou jumped onto Teru, gripping his shoulders with a cheeky smile. He levitated a few inches off the air so he wouldn’t have to tiptoe when grabbing Teru’s shoulders, which seemed pretty funny from Teru’s perspective.

“Don’t drop it,” Near hummed in a tone that didn’t seem all too threatening, but Shou could tell he was being serious. 

“Alright, alright! Mello, tell your boyfriend to quit with that baby pout of his.” Shou laughed, holding his hands out, and engulfed the statue in bright orange. Mello flushed red, obviously not complying to Shou’s request.

“I do not make a baby pout,” Near said, almost monotonously, a tiny hint of irritation in his voice. He realized this might be the first time L would witness a creation of his, even though he had built it with friends, and felt rather giddy inside about it. A happy sort of giddy.

He stepped in front of Saitama with expecting eyes, hands cupped and held out towards him. For a moment, the man didn’t understand, then perked up and dug into his jacket pocket, retrieving all of Near’s LEGO figurines. He dropped them into Near’s open palms, and the boy smiled softly in thanks.

“Let’s head out then, shall we?” Poe suddenly spoke up, then ran through a list of things he should say to a group of children and two adults in his head. “Is...anyone hungry, or anything?”

“Chocolate.” Mello mumbled under his breath and Matt laughed, pulling out his emergency chocolate bar from his pocket.

“Mel, catch,” Matt tossed the treat over.

Mello turned his head and opened his mouth, only to have the bar hit him square on the nose. He hissed in pain, catching the chocolate as it fell off his face, and held his nose. He had expected Matt to toss a small piece like always. 

Matt wheezed in laughter, pushing Mello’s fringe aside to check on him, “Are you okay? That was- I wish I could’ve recorded that!”

“Mello, you’re smarter than that,” Near frowned, stuffing all of his LEGO toys into his limited pockets.

“Shut up,” Mello growled, rubbing his nose gently before letting his hand fall back to his side.

It looked like no one was hungry, which somehow made Poe more nervous than it should, so they left the mall without grabbing anything to eat. They hoped no one would question or notice the large LEGO statue that was floating off the ground by a few inches trailing along behind them.

“That is amazing,” Reigen snapped a picture, despite already having so many photos of it sent by Saitama earlier on. “You made its eyes glow too, you all are so talented!”

Matt blushed, rubbing the back of his neck bashfully, “Aw, when you put it like that…”

“Where are you guys going to keep it?”

They all went silent, and Near, who was sitting by the lego statue, looked at Reigen for a moment, before looking back down at his neatly lined up lego toys with an expressionless look, “We won’t.”

“You won’t be keeping it?” Reigen asked, gazing at the rest of them for confirmation. “As in, you’ll be dismantling it later?” He took the silence as a yes and his eyebrows dipped, continuing with a frown, “That’s...sad.”

“It’s okay, we have pictures of it and stuff,” Matt shrugged.

Kyouka picked at her dress, looking away with a soft sigh, “It won’t be the same though. Compared to the real statue.”

“Aw, Kyouka, you have the real thing with you! As much as I don’t want it gone too, I doubt we can really keep the statue,” Kenji said, giving Kyouka an empathetic smile.

Ranpo poked at it, just to get a feel of the blocks calculatively placed together to form the details that were identical to the real Demon Snow. He rubbed his chin, noticing how big it was. It was probably around the same height as Poe, if not a little bigger. “Can’t we keep it?” Ranpo whined, turning to his boyfriend.

Poe sighed, fully expecting his reaction, and shook his head, “It can’t fit onto the train. Its width is too large.”

“We’ll deliver by mail!”

“And where do you intend on keeping it?”

Ranpo’s eyebrow quirked up in annoyance, “In the office, duh.”

“Ranpo, the office isn’t big enough either.”

“I could keep it, it’d be a shame to take it down,” L said, hands stuffed into his pockets and feet lazily slipped into sneakers. That prompted Near to look up with his round doe eyes, seemingly going bigger and brighter and the mere thought of L keeping one of his works. Technically still not completely his, but you get the point.

“No fair! That’s literally a statue of Demon Snow, Kyouka’s ability! Who is also my colleague!” Ranpo pouted, his arms folded.

“Yes, I am aware. But as your boyfriend said, it probably can’t fit in your workplace. I can safekeep it for you until further notice,” L replied, tracing his finger down the lego blade. From a distance, one couldn’t have noticed the statue was made of lego, so the katana actually looked real.

“You’re only doing that to make that kid happy,” Ranpo huffed, and he wasn’t exactly wrong. L did admire the statue to a certain extent, but after working on the Kira case, it had taught him to become a little more sympathetic to others, and keeping it around for Near was the least he could do to display his slightly improved morals.

He didn’t answer Ranpo, which immediately proved that Ranpo was right about his assumption, like always.

“Well that settles it, Near’s brother can keep the statue,” Doutei said, lollipop between his teeth. 

Teru beamed, making Doutei flinch, and grabbed Mello by his shoulders, “Great! Mello, come here, have you tried using makeup before?”

“Sorry?” Mello squinted in confusion.

“Red lipstick should look good on you, right Little Brother?” Teru glanced at Ritsu, who rolled his eyes before staring at Mello for a moment. 

The raven nodded slowly, then added, “Black eyeshadow.”

“Ugh, boring! Green, green, green!” Teru started pushing Mello to the nearest bathroom, dragging Ritsu along with his telekinesis, and left his bags of clothes with Shigeo to care.

“I hate it here.” Mello grumbled.

“You’ll get used to it,” Ritsu mumbled, surrounded by yellow and hovering over the boy.

“Ah, my boyfriend has been kidnapped, I should--” Shou began walking towards the direction Teru had taken off, but was stopped by Reigen, who jabbed his thumb at the Demon Snow statue.

“Mind helping carrying that thing for Near’s brother?” Reigen asked, and Shou groaned, dragging his hands down his face. Reigen smiled softly, giving Shou’s shoulder a firm squeeze before letting go. “It won’t take long. I have a notebook and pencil if you want to draw afterwards.”

“Deal.” Shou immediately said, bringing his finger back and throwing it forward, and the state quickly moved forward as well. “Let’s go!”

“You want to create miniature robots with me?” Doutei suddenly said, his question directed at Matt. He had noticed the boy was pretty good with tinkering with things, despite his weird nickname for gadgets, and figured he could probably join him in building for fun.

“Hell yeah!” Matt pumped both his fists into the air and Doutei took a step back, not super used to energetic people. 

The only children left were Near, Shigeo, Kenji, and Kyouka, who all stood awkwardly next to each other. Near flicked at one of his toy legos, letting it bounce against Shigeo’s ankle, and proceeded to twirl his hair with a soft look, “Do...you three want to join me...in...I have a lot of toys back in...a room...we could...”

“Sounds fun!” Kenji instantly replied, which made Near blink fast in response. Kyouka and Shigeo exchanged blank looks, but both ended up shooting Near an identical small smile and nodded.

Near stood up and scooped all of his toys into his hands, directing them to their destination with an excited sort of bounce in his steps.

Funnily enough, the two adult couples of the group were left alone together, and the air was pretty tense since they didn’t get to interact all that much. Ranpo couldn’t care less what the other two did, but it seemed Poe was too polite to just ditch them.

“Do you want to join us at the cafe? I don’t have much on me except for a novel of mystery to keep Ranpo entertained,” Poe mumbled, digging into his coat for it.

“Hey, do you think cyborg there is smart enough to solve one of your difficult mystery novels?” Ranpo asked in a taunting manner, making Genos twitch, just small enough for a normal person not to notice, but Ranpo did. 

“We’ll see,” Genos glared, taking up the challenge immediately. 

“Oh, you can do that. I’ll be at the side playing Animal Crossing on my switch,” Saitama poked at Geno’s side, and the blonde obliged, lifting his shirt up below his ribs, and Poe looked away, even though there was almost nothing to see.

A perk about having a cyborg boyfriend was that Saitama could easily store electronics with him. Geno had specially requested a function from Dr. Kuseno to let him have little compartments to keep Saitama’s Nintendo switch and any other small things he had.

Saitama’s Nintendo switch slowly poked out of Genos’ side, which looked like a VHS tape being taken out of the player, and Ranpo blinked in surprise. Not because Genos could do that of course, but because Saitama had a console that Ranpo had at the moment.

The man had brought his own switch along in case L’s job for him turned out to be boring -it didn’t, it was fun messing with other people’s heads- and smiled widely, jumping forward, “What’s your friend code? Let me visit your island!”

That was pretty much how the day went on; Mello, Teru, and Ritsu had a mini dress up party with all the clothes Teru had bought, though since they left his bags with Shigeo, they had to travel out of the bathroom to go grab them, but opted to remain in the waiting room since the rest were there. 

Shou managed to locate them pretty fast, and spent his time sketching portraits of Ritsu’s face, which had been decorated with pretty colors thanks to Teru. Matt and Doutei had fun creating little drones and such, every so often letting them roam free and disturb Near’s group, who were roleplaying with all of his toys.

Sometimes, something wild would happen during Near’s play session, which would cause everyone in the room to pause and watch. 

(“You killed my husband!” Kyouka's voice, despite being flat, conveyed the message well enough for people to gasp. She moved the arms of the little plush, like it was pointing an accusatory finger at Near’s toy.

“Rebecca, it’s not what you think!” Near tapped his toy gently on the ground to show it was full of emotion, even though his tone was flat as well.

“I won’t hesitate, you fiend!” Kyouka picked up a toy sword that oddly looked like it could be used as a toothpick with how transparent and thin it looked.

“Rebecca, it won’t bring him back,” Shigeo bumped his figurine against Kyouka’s plush.

“Oh but I know how you can see him again!” Kenji scooted forward, pulling out the same toothpick looking sword for his finger puppet.)

Genos and Poe spent the rest of their day going through Poe’s book, which was a lot funner than Poe had anticipated, while their boyfriends played Animal Crossing and Smash Bros at the side. They had to stop playing for a while, because Ranpo kept beating Saitama in Smash Bros, and the hero couldn’t risk breaking his Nintendo switch again.

As for Reigen and L, they hung back with where the statue had been placed, and accidentally had a short consultation session. It was a habit of Reigen’s to analyze people, and L’s character interested him. Mostly because L looked...troubled as a person. 

“Your first friend was placed into jail and was the killer behind the mass genocide of criminals, I’m sure it’s been rough,” Reigen had said, very, very softly.

And L didn’t want to cry, he wasn’t the type to get emotional, but Reigen had this ability to make people come to their senses, to realize their surroundings. For all of L’s life, _this_ had been his norm, and for him to finally get it in his head that it shouldn’t, was really more groundbreaking than it should be. 

Ironically enough, this day had been more eventful than the last, and they weren’t even partaking in the event half the time. 

It felt incredibly weird, having to say goodbye to your new good friends, without having any idea if you’d be seeing them again. If Near hadn’t been so selfish and clingy to every one of his toys, he would’ve given one to Kenji, Kyouka, and Shigeo as a gift of appreciation or something.

Mello came out of the experience even prettier than before, now knowing how makeup works, and although he was pretty sure he won’t be using that skill as often as Teru would, he still enjoyed learning. He mostly liked Ritsu’s aesthetic, though.

Matt was definitely going to be making more robots in the future after seeing all the things Doutei could do. For someone younger than him, he sure was talented, and Matt was almost jealous. Almost.

Reigen had texted Shigeo’s phone before nightfall, reminding the kids that they had to go pack and get ready to leave for their train later, and maybe try to grab a quick early dinner. So they were the first to depart, exchanging numbers with Doutei, Kenji, and Kyouka before doing so. Matt was the only one that had a phone with him, for some odd reason, but promised he’d share their numbers with Mello and Near when they got home.

Ritsu raised an eyebrow at that, because it awfully sounded like he was implying they lived together, but didn’t comment on it. 

Saying their final goodbyes, the espers left, and the room got a whole lot quieter.

“Y’know, if they’re leaving, I might have to leave soon too.” Doutei rubbed the back of his neck, lollipop in hand. 

“I think it’s best if you all leave now, to be honest, since you all stay in the same hotel,” Near mumbled, gathering all his toys into one big pile. 

“How’d you know that?” Kenji tilted his head, rather surprised.

“I had the feeling,” Near replied offhandedly.

There was a pause, and Doutei got up, gnawing gently on his lollipop, “This is goodbye then. I don’t know when we can meet again, since I’ll be busy with hero work and all...it was nice meeting you all.”

“Gee, you’re a lot sappier than those psychics,” Matt snorted. “But, uh, yeah. Likewise. See you around then? Hopefully?”

Doutei shrugged, already making his way to the door, “Hopefully.” Then the door clicked shut.

“I really didn’t expect we’d be making any friends here,” Kyouka muttered, sitting on the floor with her knees against her chest. She rested her cheek on them, looking at Kenji’s bright smile. “Do you think they’ll let us visit again one day?”

“Oh! Of course! But probably after another major event,” Kenji answered brightly, and Kyouka deflated slightly, letting out a soft sigh. 

It didn’t take long for the two agency members to leave as well and the waiting room was back to having just three kids.

* * *

“Kid, you’ll be the death of me, I swear,” Reigen ran a hand through his hair in frustration, watching Teru forcefully shove most of the new clothes he bought into his backpack. The blonde had managed to convince Shou to store some of his clothes as well, and even Shigeo, but Ritsu, as expected, didn’t budge.

“It’s okay, I can just keep the rest of these in the shopping bags,” Teru, despite struggling, smiled widely.

“Are you planning to get rid of some of your old clothes?” Ritsu asked, already packed up and ready to go. 

“I’ll have you know my closet definitely has enough space for these lovelies!”

“He doesn’t,” Reigen whispered really softly so Teru couldn’t hear. “We’ll just recycle some of his more worn out ones.”

There was a loud zipping sound and a proud laughter, and Teru stood up, backpack dangerously bulging yet definitely closed and zipped up. 

“If that explodes on the train, I will make sure to use your tears to wipe the floor clean,” Ritsu threatened, and Teru didn’t have the heart to ask why he would use tears if clothes can’t stain floors.

* * *

Unsurprisingly enough, the train was almost packed with people, and Doutei had the feeling they were all the people who had given up on L’s challenge due to the fact that Ranpo had made it harder. He didn’t feel much pity for them, since it was to be expected, but he still found the crowd annoying.

When the train pulled into the station, Doutei grabbed onto Saitama’s backpack and Genos’ hand so he wouldn’t be swept away by the mass of people boarding the train. It was a pity they had to leave at a separate time from Reigen and the others, otherwise, surviving this crowd might’ve been easier.

They managed to find a seat, and Doutei wondered if it was just their luck or the fact that people were too scared to snatch it from Genos, even though the guy wasn’t even doing anything. He sat down, taking out his lollipop once more to keep himself occupied as the train began to pull out from the station.

He sent a few more texts to Zombieman, hoping he wasn’t busy with any hero work, and waited a few good minutes before turning his phone off.

“You had fun?” Genos asked, letting Saitama drift off against his shoulder, which didn’t look all too comfortable in Doutei’s perspective. 

“Yeah. I did. I didn’t think I’d have this much fun honestly,” Doutei mumbled, gripping the stick of his lollipop in thought. 

“That’s good then. Saitama has a few pictures he took from when you were building that lego statue earlier, do you want me to forward some to you?” Genos asked, taking Saitama’s phone out of his pocket. He knew Saitama trusted him enough to take his phone whenever, so he had no problem opening the photos app to send them to Doutei.

“Ah, yes. Please. Thanks,” Doutei shifted forward, phone in hand.

* * *

Kyouka didn’t realize she had fallen asleep against Kenji’s shoulder until he had shaken her awake. They were almost reaching home on the train and Kenji figured he should wake her up a few minutes early, just in case. It took awhile for her to process her surroundings and she quickly apologized to Kenji for falling asleep on his shoulder, in which he replied with a shy yet still bright smile, waving his hand while saying it was okay.

Ranpo was draped under Poe’s cape, asleep on the taller man’s lap, and it actually took a bit longer to wake him up. Poe was already up the moment Kenji walked over to them, but since Ranpo was asleep on his lap, he couldn’t exactly move. It was only when the doors began to open did Ranpo finally roll off Poe, and the two had to scramble to get their bags and get off the train before the door closed on them.

Atsushi was outside the station waiting and holding a sign that wasn’t really well done, which basically meant he was debating on whether a sign was appropriate or not before settling on something casual. All it said was Ranpo, Kenji, Kyouka, and Poe’s name with stars around it. 

When Kyouka spotted him, she threw her arms around him and gave him a tight hug before letting go with a small smile, “I had fun.”

“That’s great to hear,” Atsushi grinned back, turning around so they could walk back home.

Kenji watched Kyouka smile as she interacted with Atsushi and admired how the two shone like a full moon’s gentle light, and he found himself slowly going breathless each time Kyouka laughed at something her brother figure said. He realized, as each moment passed, that he really liked that smile.

He already found Kyouka pretty from the start, but it was only after this trip did he notice how much he _really_ liked her. He wondered if he could make Kyouka laugh like that one day.

So making up his mind, he grabbed Kyouka by the shoulders, slipped them down to her hands and held them tight, beaming so wide and so sparkly it almost felt intimidating. Not to Kyouka though, not much could properly scare her anymore.

And right under the streetlight lamp, he leaned forward, but not too close, and asked, “Would you like to go on a date with me tomorrow?”

“Huh?” Kyouka stared, blood rushing into her face and ears.

“Hah?” Atsushi poked his head beside her, staring right into Kenji’s smiling face. 

“If only I was as bold as he was back then,” Poe mumbled, watching as the scene unfolded in front of him. Ranpo suppressed the urge to laugh out loud, because he had expected this from the start. He didn’t want to boast, but after reading Poe’s many novels with romance side plots, he had become an expert on crushes and such, and had predicted this outcome since yesterday night.

“We don’t have to go anywhere fancy,” Kenji continued, optimistic and confident that Kyouka would say yes. “Just a simple cafe, or a garden, or a field!”

Kyouka’s fingers squirmed, though not because she was uncomfortable, but because she was actually considering it. She ran her schedule for tomorrow before finally deciding that she had the time to go on a date with him. So with a pinked face, she quickly nodded.

“Yay!” Kenji cheered, letting Kyouka’s hands go. He never realized they’d be a little cold compared to his and hoped his hands had warmed hers up. “Goodnight, Kyouka! See you tomorrow!” And he walked home in a different direction, bouncing in each step.

“You too,” Kyouka whispered, not sure if Kenji would catch it.

* * *

The thing about the Wammy’s House when they got back was the fact that they slept in separate dorms, and it bothered the three greatly. After having to share a room the past few weeks, they had grown accustomed to each other’s sleeping presence, and didn’t know if they were even allowed to switch rooms for a small reason like this. 

“It’s cool. We can just sneak into each others’ beds at night. We can rotate and stuff,” Matt made hand gestures as he explained, which looked a bit weird since he had to drag his luggage along while doing so.

“Beds aren’t big enough for the three of us,” Near said, lagging behind them since his luggage was filled with mostly toys than clothes.

“Can’t we switch with a kid?” Mello huffed, strands of his hair braided and pinned up nicely from the side, a hairstyle he learnt from Teru that he liked.

“Too much trouble.”

“You’re too nice.”

“Nah there’s definitely a way we can all fit in one bed,” Matt said, making Near frown. They reached the entrance, where they knew there would be people waiting for them and welcoming them back home, and the three took a deep breath.

Matt pushed the door and it didn’t budge. He pushed again, and again, and again.

“Matt--” Mello said.

“I got this, don’t worry,” Matt smiled nervously, pushing again.

“Matt.” Near sighed.

“I said I got this!”

Mello glanced at Near, who glanced back, and the two didn’t know how to tell their dumb boyfriend that he was supposed to pull the door open and not push.

It took Matt a few more tries before he paused for a moment, turned the knob, and pulled. He stared blankly at the slightly pulled ajar door, “Oh.”

“I want to sleep.” Near groaned, rubbing his face, the jet lag was getting to him, even though the sun was still in the sky.

Matt fully pulled open the door, his arms spread wide to greet everyone, “We are dating!”

Mello lunged for Matt, covering his mouth and bringing him down to the ground, and the two practically began to wrestle for about three minutes straight before Matt admitted defeat. Mello huffed, glaring at everyone, daring them to question the scene.

Near was already slipping out of the crowd, making his way to his room so he could finally take a nap, leaving both his boyfriends to fend for themselves.

“Welcome...home?” Linda jazzed her hands in confusion.

**Author's Note:**

> Hey, maybe I'll write more Matt/Mello/Near and Kenji/Kyouka when I'm free.  
> This took about...two weeks to write? I had fun. I _might_ write an epilogue since the ending feels a bit rushed (I wanted to go in a certain order: They pack, get on train, get off train, get home)  
> [Come yell at me on Tumblr if you want :)](https://justphilia.tumblr.com/)


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